Bargain $core!
Being female & Saggitarian, I am genetically fated to suffer the twin vices of curiosity & bargain hunting. I am an inveterate collector of "things that take my fancy" - which can be anything from coins to corals to crystals.
The other day we stopped at a large garage sale for a sticky. Needless to say, i LOOOOOOOVVVVVE garage sales & Op shops. I am frequently astounded at the things other people, through either ignorance or disinterest, deem worthless & throw out. I'm glad they do, however coz I wouldn't have landed THIS:
I like stones & gems & the like & this urn/vase grabbed my attention immediately. It is solid turned & polished stone & is very heavy. As i examined it, i quickly realised it was not simply "stone" - it is stone teeming with ancient marine FOSSILS!!!
I can roughly ID some of them, like this ammonite (dont know species though)
Or this spiral shell (Turrilites i think or perhaps Turritella)
And i THINK this 1 is the top of a crinoid (sea lily):
And this 1 is probably a coral:
And this 1 looks to be a small clam/scallop:
Others defeat me (though sea urchin comes to mind):
The small bits of bright reflection are bits of opalisation.
Overall, im pretty delighted with it. Im keen to ID species so I can work out the era (Mesozoic, Paleozoic, Jurassic, Triaassic, etc) & thus pin down where the stone comes from. I suspect its from England.
Fun fact: the poem "she sells sea shells" is actually about a woman named Mary Anning who lived in the mid 1800s. She grew up dirt poor but her father taught her about fossils and she would sell the fossillized shells/animals they found to tourists in the Regis Lime area. She spent her life doing this & when she died, her personal collection was given to the British Museum of Natural History where you can still see them. Her many discoveries & copious notes/documentation were and are a huge gift to the sciences that study ancient life. They are still being studied and identified today.
The other day we stopped at a large garage sale for a sticky. Needless to say, i LOOOOOOOVVVVVE garage sales & Op shops. I am frequently astounded at the things other people, through either ignorance or disinterest, deem worthless & throw out. I'm glad they do, however coz I wouldn't have landed THIS:
I like stones & gems & the like & this urn/vase grabbed my attention immediately. It is solid turned & polished stone & is very heavy. As i examined it, i quickly realised it was not simply "stone" - it is stone teeming with ancient marine FOSSILS!!!
I can roughly ID some of them, like this ammonite (dont know species though)
Or this spiral shell (Turrilites i think or perhaps Turritella)
And i THINK this 1 is the top of a crinoid (sea lily):
And this 1 is probably a coral:
And this 1 looks to be a small clam/scallop:
Others defeat me (though sea urchin comes to mind):
The small bits of bright reflection are bits of opalisation.
Overall, im pretty delighted with it. Im keen to ID species so I can work out the era (Mesozoic, Paleozoic, Jurassic, Triaassic, etc) & thus pin down where the stone comes from. I suspect its from England.
Fun fact: the poem "she sells sea shells" is actually about a woman named Mary Anning who lived in the mid 1800s. She grew up dirt poor but her father taught her about fossils and she would sell the fossillized shells/animals they found to tourists in the Regis Lime area. She spent her life doing this & when she died, her personal collection was given to the British Museum of Natural History where you can still see them. Her many discoveries & copious notes/documentation were and are a huge gift to the sciences that study ancient life. They are still being studied and identified today.
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