Author: More than a Dodo

I'm Public Engagement Manager at Oxford University Museum of Natural History and I look after permanent displays and other interpretation. I do a bit of social media on the side, too.

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Celebrating Smith

22nd March 2015, Churchill, Oxfordshire

Today marks the 246th birthday of William Smith, the ‘father of English geology’. While the Museum has been marking this important day for a number of years, 2015 also happens to be a particularly special year for this remarkable man.

William SmithWilliam Smith is perhaps most famous for publishing the first geological map of England and Wales in 1815, making this the bicentenary of the incredible feat.

Though Smith single-handledly mapped the geology of the country, and created a map that would change the way we understood the world beneath our feet, too few people know his name and what he achieved.

To celebrate the bicentenary, and also in the hope that Smith will become a wider-known figure in the history of science, a number of organisations across the world, including us here at the Museum of Natural History, will be holding events during the year.

William Smith mapThis weekend marked the official kick-off of events with the opening of the Churchill Heritage Centre special exhibition, curated by the Museum and displayed in the heart of Smith’s home town. A plaque to mark the place where he was born in 1769 was also unveiled, which you can see in the photo at the top of this post.

The plaque, sponsored by the Curry Fund was unveiled by Professor Hugh Torrens, the leading expert on William Smith. A large crowd gathered for the event, with a mix of local people proud of their connection to one of their most famous residents, as well as a familiar group of Smith academics, experts and enthusiasts.

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Smith enthusiasts and Churchill residents gather for the exhibition launch

The exhibition, which is open weekends and bank holidays, will run until the end of September.

IMG_2729It includes well known publications from the William Smith archive here at the Museum of Natural History such as his geological map of Oxfordshire. Rarely seen items such as letters between himself and his niece, an excerpt from his diaries and the marriage deed of his grandparents will also be on display.

The William Smith archive can be found at www.williamsmithonline.com.

Kate Santry, Head of Archives and Library

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How the squid got its ink sac

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An intriguing new fossil has been donated to the Museum.  It’s a large straight-shelled nautiloid with a colourful history.

Nautiloids are marine cephalopods related to modern-day octopus, cuttlefish and squid. They have an external shell and horny jaws but the soft parts of nautiloids are rarely preserved as fossils. Comparison with the living Nautilus suggests that this animal also had a ring of tentacles surrounding the mouth.

The donated nautiloid fossil in its original location in the family home
The donated nautiloid fossil in its original location in the family home

This particular specimen was handed down through five generations of one family, before finally being donated to the Museum by Mrs  Jan O’Leary via her children, Tim O’Leary and Kate Whittingham.

Accompanying the nautiloid was a lithograph of the specimen, labelled:

ACTINOCERAS.  (MOUNTAIN LIMESTONE.)  Newbury Marble Works – The Peak, Derbyshire. SECTION IN THE MUSEUM, OSMASTON MANOR

“Mountain Limestone” is an old-fashioned term for Carboniferous Limestone, which means the fossil was from the Lower Carboniferous Period, around 350 million years ago. Osmaston Manor was the historic home of the donor family until its demolition in 1965.

On the far right hand side of the donated lithograph is a reconstruction of what the nautiloid may have looked like in life (shown at the top of this post). This is very unlike modern reconstructions of nautiloids, and looks rather more like the reconstruction of a squid-like belemnoid (complete with ink sac) in William Buckland’s Geology and Mineralogy (1836). So did nautiloids have ink sacs like belemnoids and modern cephalopods? What was known at the time the reconstruction was drawn, and what do we know today?

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Looking at dates of construction and demolition of Osmaston Manor, as well as the operation dates for the company credited with producing the lithograph, we can assume that it was created sometime between 1867 and 1888. So what information on fossil cephalopods would have been available at that time? Buckland provided proof that belemnoids had ink sacs, but, information on nautiloid soft parts at that time was practically non-existant. We can only suppose that the reconstruction is an extrapolation from the belemnoid evidence. Given that this specimen was living in the Carboniferous Period (359 – 299 million years ago), and the belemnoids described were from the Jurassic Period  (199 – 146 million years ago), this is quite a leap of faith.

And the state of knowledge today? Phylogenetic studies suggest that ammonoids and coleoids (belemnoids and their living relatives) split from from the nautiloids in the Silurian Period (443 – 416 million years ago), then coleoids split from ammonoids in the Devonian Period (416 – 359 million years ago). But where on this branching tree did ink sacs arise?

A paper by Doguzhaeva and colleagues (2003) described an ink sac in the Upper Carboniferous coleoid Donovaniconus, which means that ink sacs had indeed evolved as far back as the Carboniferous. But, despite intriguing historical reconstructions and beautiful fossils, we are yet to find any evidence that nautiloids really did have ink sacs at all.

Eliza Howlett, Collections Manager, Earth

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Air bubble gems

Amethyst 3Beautiful gemstones are always popular with the public when they’re brought out for Spotlight Specimens. Monica Price talks about some she’s been showing off recently at our daily drop-in sessions.

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Blog brandingNow here’s a mineral that most people recognise straight away when I bring it out for Spotlight specimens. It is amethyst, and it is the most popular of all purple gem minerals. By a happy coincidence it is very common too, so jewellery made with amethyst need not be very expensive.

But that wasn’t always the case. In the past, fine, large, transparent crystals of amethyst could only be found in Germany, Russia and a few other places in the world. In Europe, the colour purple is traditionally associated with royalty and wealth, and so rare amethyst gems would feature in crowns and jewellery worn by heads of state and religious leaders.

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Amethyst is actually a variety of one of the Earth’s most common minerals, quartz.  Quartz is composed of silicon dioxide and helps form many different kinds of rock…. it even makes up most beach sands! Amethyst is the kind of quartz that contains a little bit of iron to turn it purple.

Amethyst 2So how did amethyst suddenly become so common? During the 18th century, huge flows of volcanic lava were found by explorers in Brazil and Uruguay. Some had air bubbles which were lined with superb purple crystals of amethyst. Soon, these crystal-filled cavities were being sent to Europe, and today, they are sold all over the world.  The biggest bubbles were a metre or more in size – huge! Nowadays, nearly all the amethyst you see for sale comes from those 135 million year-old South American lava flows.

My spotlight specimens include an amethyst gemstone and some lovely examples of those gas bubble cavities lined with crystals. One rather curious thing is that the crystals are rarely purple all the way through. The colour typically concentrates towards the tips of the six-sided crystals.  If you come when I next show my ‘gas bubble gems’, you will see exactly what I mean!

Monica Price, Head of Earth Collections

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Ray of sunshine

nectarina_solaris Working on the Lepidoptera Project in the Entomology department keeps me very busy during the day, but I rarely get to see other parts of the Life Collections. So it was a real treat when my boss Darren said I could look at the specimens in the bird skin store. While carefully going through the drawers, I found this spectacular little bird from the family Nectariniidae. The species is Cinnyris solaris, which is also has the evocative name of Flame-Breasted Sun Bird. This particular specimen was an amazing surprise, because of the label data. It states:

Flores (lesser Sunda Islands, Indonesia) [?1862] Noted “Wallace 1862”[?Collected or obtained  from Alfred Russell Wallace?] F.P. Pascoe Coll. 1909

A bird that was probably collected by Alfred Russel Wallace! I checked the excel spreadsheet that listed all of the birds in the museum collected by the famous 19th century naturalist and got my second surprise- it wasn’t on the list! Five other Wallace birds were listed (including the two shown here) but the Sun Bird wasn’t there.

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Two of the other Wallace birds in the Museum’s collection

I decided to do some research on the specimen, and here is what I found out: The specimen was donated to the museum in 1909 by the English entomologist Francis Polkinghorne Pascoe, who acquired a lot of material from Wallace over the years. In Wallace’s paper A List of Birds inhabiting the Islands of Timor, Flores and Lombok the bird is mentioned as Nectarina solaris (it was later placed in the genus Cinnyris.) The bird would have been in Wallace’s possession when Pascoe acquired it.

Wallace, A.R. (1863) A list of Birds inhabiting the Islands of Timor, Flores and Lombok with Descriptions of the New Species pg. 486
Wallace, A.R. (1863) A list of Birds inhabiting the Islands of Timor, Flores and Lombok with Descriptions of the New Species pg. 486

However, the bird was also more likely to have been collected by Wallace’s assistant Charles Allen rather than Wallace himself, as Wallace never set foot on Flores. Wallace did not think much of Charles Allen as an assistant, as detailed in this letter to Wallace’s mother on 30th September 1854:

If it were not for the expense I would send Charles home; I think I could not have chanced upon a more utterly…careless boy.

nectarina_solaris_versoIn 1893, the major portion of the collection was donated to the British Museum in London via a relative, Miss Pascoe, but she donated the remainder to the Hope Department here at the Museum in 1909. Alfred Russel Wallace himself was said to have suggested this. These items were mostly insects, but also included this beautiful Flame-Breasted Sun Bird. Today the Flame-Breasted Sun Bird is a scarce species due to its limited island range, but is not considered threatened. I feel privileged to have chanced across such an amazing specimen in the bird stores. Gina Allnatt, Curatorial assistant (Lepidoptera) ** Letter used by Gina for research can be seen at Wallace Letters Online

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Top 5 – Phil’s Fossils

1280px-Scopimera_in_Tanjung_Aru_Beach_2b

Next up to share his favourite five specimens from the Museum’s collection is Philip Hadland. Phil joined us a few months ago as an Earth Collections assistant and has already discovered some fascinating fossils in the stores.

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5 – Fossil crab from Folkestone

Necrocarcinus labeschii (Deslongschamps, 1835) from the Gault Clay. Scale in mm.
Necrocarcinus labeschii (Deslongschamps, 1835) from the Gault Clay

These Cretaceous crabs are interesting because of their similarity to modern Bubbler Crabs. As you can see from the photo at the top of this post, Bubbler Crabs feed during low tides on microscopic creatures living between grains of sand, processing it into ‘sand balls’.

Natural cast of a footprint resembling the form of an ostrich foot from the Lower Greensand with ‘sand balls’. Approximately 250 mm long. Natural cast of a footprint resembling the form of an ostrich foot from the Lower Greensand with ‘sand balls’. Approximately 250 mm long.
Natural cast of a footprint resembling the form of an ostrich foot from the Lower Greensand with ‘sand balls’. Approximately 250 mm long.

In some cases, trace fossils very similar to the modern sand balls can also be found. Natural casts resembling ostrich footprints have been found alongside the ‘sand ball’ fossils.

Maybe the crabs were a food source for the mysterious animals that left the footprints?

4 – TV rock

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Ulexite (NaCaB5O6(OH)6•5(H2O)) (hydrated sodium calcium borate hydroxide), is a mineral with natural fibre optic properties. The fibres transmit light through internal reflection, which is the same way that fibre optics work. If a crystal of ulexite is cut correctly and placed on an image, that image will be projected to the other surface. For this reason it is also known as TV rock.

3 – Heteromorphic ammonites

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A tower shell shaped ammonite, Turrilites costatus (Lamarck, 1801)

Heteromorphic ammonites are extinct cephalopods, related to squid and cuttlefish. They are different from other ammonites with flat spirals; they coil in unusual ways. Some are shaped like paperclips and some resemble tower shells. They are a fascinating enigma and we can probably only guess how they lived. I suspect that at least some were mimicking other animals. Mimicry is often used by living animals to catch food or to avoid becoming prey themselves, so perhaps they sat motionless on the sea bed waiting to devour unsuspecting crustaceans, a popular prey of living cephalopods.

2 – Challenger Shark Tooth

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A fossil shark’s tooth collected on the Challenger expedition (1872-1876), dredged from the Pacific ocean, at a depth of 2350 fathoms, over 4 kilometers. The naturalist Henry Moseley (1844-1891) published notes on the expedition, describing numerous encounters with living sharks. The largest they encountered was Carcharodon rondelettii known today as as Carcharodon carcharias, the great white shark. In the notes he also states “The Challenger dredged in the Pacific Ocean in deep water numerous teeth of what must be an immensely large species of this genus”. In fact these were fossil teeth of the extinct giant shark Carcharocles megalodon. Awesome!

1 – Kirkdale Cave Mammal Fossils

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In 1821 labourers in a quarry at Kirkdale, Yorkshire, found a cave full of animal bones. Professor William Buckland of Oxford University visited the cave and recognised over 20 kinds of animal, including Elephant, Hippopotamus and Hyaena. These fossils were 120,000 years old! He thought that it was once a Hyaena den, as there were many hyaena bones in the cave. To prove his idea he gave an Ox bone to a Hyaena, which was travelling through Oxford in Mr Wombwell’s menagerie. The Hyaena produced gnaw marks identical to those on a comparable Bison shin bone from the cave. I think this was really clever. It may be the earliest example of experimental palaeontology.

Philip Hadland, Collections assistant (Earth)

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Geoblitzing the minerals

Aphodius sphacelatus

Like most museums, the Leeds Museum Service has far more specimens than they can possibly show in their public displays. Much of their huge collection is carefully stored in their Discovery Centre, waiting to be used. Trouble is, if you don’t have an expert on the team, how do you know which specimens are particularly rare or precious, which ones are important for researchers, which ones are ideal for people to handle..? Indeed which ones are really no use to anyone anymore?! The Leeds curatorial team decided to carry out a ‘Geoblitz’, inviting specialists in all the different branches of geology to go through storage trays specimen by specimen, telling them about the highlights (and occasionally the lowlights) in the collection. The project has been generously funded by the John Ellerman Foundation, and will also include a programme of activities and exhibitions to start making use of the best specimens. You can follow their progress on their blog.

Monica and Neil hard at work in the collections
Monica and Neil hard at work in the collections

I was delighted to be invited to be a visiting expert, looking at the mineral collection, and I’ve just come back from three days working through literally thousands of specimens. It was great to see how many had information about the places where they were found, some even saying which level or vein they came from in the mine or quarry. Nearly all those mines and quarries are now closed, and most are flooded or inaccessible. This means the mineral samples collected from them are irreplaceable and particularly useful for research.

The instructions were that I’d read out the tray number and specimen number, and then explain why I thought the sample was so interesting or special. Project officer Neil Owen was busy taking lots of notes. There were some incredibly beautiful display specimens (like the beautiful wavelite sample at the top of this post), some excellent examples of very rare minerals, and many samples ideal for people to both see and touch. Trouble was, each time he took the tray lid off to reveal something exciting inside, I’d always start by saying ‘wow!!’ and only think to tell him that all-important specimen number last of all!

Superb yellow crystals of the very rare lead mineral matlockite from Matlock in Derbyshire, where it was first discovered
Superb yellow crystals of the very rare lead mineral matlockite from Matlock in Derbyshire, where it was first discovered

It was fascinating to see another good museum collection, and I’ll be reminding researchers that Leeds has lots for them to explore. But most of all, I’m especially looking forward to seeing some of the specimens I picked out go on public display. Very best of luck to Neil and all the Leeds team, as they continue the Geoblitz!

Monica Price, Head of Earth Collections