The modern ocean is full of scary, disgusting, bizarre, awesome, and adorable organisms (multiply that by several thousand times, and you can cover prehistoric oceans too). While crinoids might not strike terror into your heart, they are pretty strange animals, which are often mistaken for plants at first glance (the name crinoid means “sea lily”).  I personally find them somewhat adorable (living, swimming feather dusters?  I mean, come on). Fossil and modern crinoids.  Image credit: http://kuow.org/post/living-gears-help-bug-jump Crinoids are a class of echinoderms, the group ..read more

I’m pleased to share our new open access paper, “Predation scars reveal declines in crab populations since the Pleistocene.” This is the 4th chapter of my PhD and basis of my current postdoc at the University of Victoria, so I’m excited to see it out! Read the paper here: https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2022.810069 Here’s a Twitter thread I wrote that explains the major findings and broader scope (written in plain language for anyone to enjoy): https://twitter.com/barnaclebarclay/status/1491944809707163650 Hope you enjoy! Living (left) and fossil (right) snails showing repair scars from crab atta ..read more

One of the hardest sets of terminology and fossils/structures for students to remember is stromatoporoids and stromatolites.  Not only are the names painfully similar, but they also look very similar, until you get your nose next to them.  Both can be massive (tens to hundreds of metres), both appear finely laminated, and both can be round or bulbous in shape.  The short version is that stromatoporoids (left image below) are body fossils, and stromatolites are more sedimentary structures (right image below).  Hard to tell apart, right? The longer version: Stromatoporoids ..read more

Colourful tunicates! Credit: Nick Hobgood If you have even had the chance to see or feel a tunicate, you’ll know they’re weird little creatures. At first glance, the tunicate resembles a sponge, with an exhalent and inhalent opening. They’re often found in similar environments, encrusting rocks, ships, and docks. Like sponges, many species of tunicates are also colonial, colourful, and generally unassuming, which is why you may not have noticed, or even heard of, tunicates. Despite their initially similar appearance, sponges and tunicates couldn’t be more different. For starters, if you ..read more

It’s Science Literacy Week here in Canada, so in celebration, this week’s Fossil Friday post is a short compilation of some great books and reading resources for anyone interested in palaeontology, ecology, evolution, and even the Canadian Rockies. Here’s a list of some of my favourite natural science related books: (1) A Natural History of Shells. Vermeij, G. J. 1993. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey. This one is probably my favourite textbooks of all time.  If you like evolution, palaeontology, or ecology, go read everything by Geerat Vermeij.  He is a genius and a ..read more

I’ve been rather quiet on my blog this past year, in part due to an intense workload down in California, studying for my candidacy exam (I passed, phew), the usual suite of conferences and writing, and of course, life. But I’ve also been doing a lot of thinking and reflection on how to be a better science communicator. This year was an immense year of growth for me both as a scientist, and as a human being. The folks of Bodega Marine Lab were amazing, and I learned so much during my time down there about marine science, the importance of collaboration and peers, and how to advocate for science ..read more

Bryozoans are the coolest little animals you’ve never heard of.  And when I say little, I mean really little.  As I tell my students, if you aren’t using a microscope, you’re missing the point.  You can’t really see anything without a scope. Each of these contains hundreds to thousands of individuals.  Image credit: http://www.kgs.ku.edu/Extension/fossils/bryozoan.html There, that’s better.  Notice the scale bar.  Image credit: https:/ectoprocta.wordpress.com/ Otherwise know as “moss animals”, these tiny little critters are mostly colonial, and most commonly found ..read more

Polished ammolite.  Photo credit: http://www.gemselect.com/other-info/rare-ammolite.php If you think diamonds are the most beautiful of the gemstones, you have clearly never seen ammolite.  Ammolite is an iridescent, opal-like gem that comes in an amazing range of vibrant colours that cover the complete visible spectrum.  The only fossil that can be commercially mined and sold in Canada, ammolite is made from the shells of an octopod-like creature called an ammonite. An ammonite shell made of ammolite.  Photo credit: http://www.canadianammolite.com/AmmoliteFacts.html Ammoni ..read more

Predation is a pretty big topic in palaeontology, but not as straight forward as you might expect.  We all have this image in our head of the T. rex from Jurassic Park feasting on another dinosaur (or perhaps the lawyer on the toilet), but where does that information come from?  Unlike in Jurassic Park, humans were never alive to actually witness a T. rex eating a Triceratops, so how can we be certain those interactions ever occurred? Anti-predatory adaptations, such as armour, spikes, frills, are a good first clue that something is trying not to be eaten.  E ..read more

I’ve been on the go for most of August, with outreach commitments, holidays, and field work in the States, so I’ve missed a few Fossil Fridays.  But even while on holidays, I was documenting some neat stuff that I discovered. Our family went on a road trip through the Canadian Rockies (which I highly recommend), starting in Edmonton, then out the Jasper, down through the Columbia Icefields and Icefields Parkway, through Lake Louise, Banff, and Canmore, and ending in Cochrane.  We had a blast, and spent most of our time hiking mountain trails (I’m hugely proud of both of my paren ..read more