Category Geography

Fossils, both plant and animal, are a valuable source of information on how life has evolved on Earth – they are a window into the past. They also provide insight on ecological, climatic and environmental changes that have taken place over the ages.

1. Beginnings of life. Apart from the sheer wonder they see the morphology of giant creatures millions of years ago from studying their fossil remains, fossils teach us about the beginnings and transformations of life itself.

2. Ecosystems. Fossils help us understand the environment where extinct life forms once existed.

3. Human origin. Paleo-anthropologists study the beginnings of human life, from the tools our ancestors used, the food they ate, their physical adjustments, to their social behaviour and migration.

4. Age of the country. All living organisms inhabited the Earth only at certain intervals and are reflected in the fossil record in sequence by each layer of rocky sediment.

5. Our past and future. The study of fossils also leads to discoveries and understandings of processes on Earth that may be of benefit to mankind.

It is wonderful for everyone to find stones that sometimes have figures of animals inside and out. People learn from fossils – Whether fossils are from humans or dinosaurs, they may not learn much about the species and cultures that existed in the past. Fossils give us educated guesses about the evolution of different species and what the climate looked like in the past.

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The word fossil comes from the Latin word fossus, meaning “having been dug up.” Fossils are often found in rock formations deep in the earth.

Fossilization is the process of remains becoming fossils. Fossilization is rare. Most organisms decompose fairly quickly after they die.

For an organism to be fossilized, the remains usually need to be covered by sediment soon after death. Sediment can include the sandy seafloor, lava, and even sticky tar.

Over time, minerals in the sediment seep into the remains. The remains become fossilized. Fossilization usually occur in organisms with hard, bony body parts, such as skeletons, teeth, or shells. Soft-bodied organisms, such as worms, are rarely fossilized.

Sometimes, however, the sticky resin of a tree can become fossilized. This is called fossilized resin or amber. Amber can preserve the bodies of many delicate, soft-bodied organisms, such as ants, flies, and mosquitoes.

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The main forms of evidence concerning ancient life are body fossils, trace fossils, and geochemical evidence that has helped researchers unravel the development of life before there were animals large enough to leave body fossils.

Paleontology is the study of prehistoric living creatures, which includes dinosaurs as well as prehistoric plants, animals, fish, insects, fungi, and even bacteria. Paleontologists investigate the fossilized record of life on Earth.

Paleontologists will not run out of work very soon because more than 99% of all animals that have ever existed are extinct. Working out the links between ancient animals and plants and their extant descendants is a part of the paleontological study. Australia, South Africa, South America, India, and Antarctica all have many fossil sources.

The scientists who study fossils may measure, draw, and photograph the fossils found. Later, when they study with the fossils in their laboratory, they utilize this knowledge. Charles Darwin revolutionized our perceptions of living organisms. Darwin’s Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection discovered and connected all of the life sciences together and explained how living things evolved and adapted.

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Yes, freeze-dried fossils found in Siberia still have flesh, even fur, on them. The bones, skin and armour of this nodosaur found offshore in Alberta, Canada, are beautifully preserved.

Since the dawn of paleontology, scientists have struggled to confirm what dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures may have looked like when they were alive. Now, a team at Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology in Alberta, Canada has brought us closer than ever to understanding our massive planetary ancestors. They discovered a dinosaur fossil that has guts, armor, and even some skin intact. In fact, it is so well-preserved; some have dubbed it a “dinosaur mummy.”

A Giant Accident

The discovery of the dino-mummy was purely accidental. On an otherwise-average afternoon in 2011 at Alberta’s Millennium Mine, heavy-equipment operator Shawn Funk was manning an excavator when he hit something hard. Funk was used to striking minerals or old marine fossils, but this was different.

Over 7,000 man-hours later, the discovery now lies in the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Paleontology. It’s an incredibly well-preserved armored herbivore called a nodosaur (a close relative of ankylosaurs, those spiky armored low-riding lizards with a mace-like tail) that lived 110 million years ago. A team carved through a 15,000-pound rock to dig out the dinosaur’s body, from its snout to its hips.

By the way, those 7,000 man-hours we mentioned? That was all one man: Royal Tyrrell Museum technician Mark Mitchell. Over the course of six years, he painstakingly chipped away the stone, spending eight months on the skull alone. But it wasn’t until after he was finished that he learned his work would be immortalized in the name of the creature.

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The remains of plants and animals – bones, shells, eggs, seeds – preserved for many thousands, and even millions, of years are called fossils. A body fossil is formed of actual parts of the organism. Other impressions, such as footprints and scratch marks, are known as trace fossils. Fossils are most often found in soft sedimentary rocks such as limestone and sandstone.

Fossils are the preserved remains, or traces of remains, of ancient organisms. Fossils are not the remains of the organism itself! They are rocks.

A fossil can preserve an entire organism or just part of one. Bones, shells, feathers, and leaves can all become fossils.

Fossils can be very large or very small. Microfossils are only visible with a microscope. Bacteria and pollen are microfossils. Macrofossils can be several meters long and weigh several tons. Macrofossils can be petrified trees or dinosaur bones.

Preserved remains become fossils if they reach an age of about 10,000 years. Fossils can come from the Archaeaean Eon (which began almost 4 billion years ago) all the way up to the Holocene Epoch (which continues today). The fossilized teeth of wooly mammoths are some of our most “recent” fossils. Some of the oldest fossils are those of ancient algae that lived in the ocean more than 3 billion years ago.

Credit: National Geographic Society

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