Earth Science Club of Northern Illinois - ESCONI

Best Teaching Tool on the Planet

From Geology.com:

USGS offers .pdf copies of “This Dynamic Planet” for free viewing on the web. You can zoom in and get a really close look at plate boundaries, earthquake locations, volcano locations, and much more. They also have paper copies for sale in the USGS store for just $14.00. 

New Mineral Named After Geology Icon

Via San Bernardino:

Bob Reynolds rocks. Sort of.

Technically, it’s more of a mineral thing.

The one-time earth sciences curator for the San Bernardino County Museum and lifelong explorer of the geology and paleontology of the Mojave Desert, recently had a newly discovered mineral named after him.

Anthony Kampf, a mineralogist with the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History, has identified and named nearly 80 new minerals since 1974 – 60 of those since 2000. Earlier this year, he published a paper on a mineral dug out of the Blue Bell Mine near Baker. Reynoldsite is the name he chose for the brown, faceted material composed of lead, along with phyllomanganate-chromate.

How the Mollusks Got Their Teeth

From SciNews:

University of Toronto graduate student Martin Smith has for the first time reconstructed mouthparts of two mollusk-like animals Odontogriphus and Wiwaxia that lived in Cambrian seas 500 million years ago.

Illustration: Wiwaxia corrugata (Matthew, 1899)
Lophotrochozoa
Halwaxiida
Wiwaxiidae

Cambrian
Burgess Shale
British Columbia, Canada 

under a Creative Commons 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)

Letter from Member about Upcoming Field Trip

Keith wrote about the upcoming field trip to the quarry in Belvidere, IL - 

Hello All,

 

I just got back from Irene through the Lizadro Museum.  It is a Dolminite limstone quarry.  The majority of the fossils found were Gastropods not many complete and mostly 1.5 Inch or less in size (Trochonema, Lophospira, Hormotoma...).  I've seen two partial Hormotoma 5 to 7 inches long.  Only one partial Trilobit (I think Illoenus ) was found.  Many poeple came up with parts of Receptoculites and few found Horn Coral.  A 7 inch segment of a straight Cephalopod was also found in a bolder.  I would suggest surface hunting first around and on the smaller rock, rock piles before taking the hammer to the bolders. 

 

Happy hunting,

 

Keith

Khyber Mineral Company

Just a heads up... one of our members owns a wonderful mineral shop - check it out! Khyber Mineral Company. 

He travels the world over to buy minerals from the local miners and sellers, including countries such as Peru, Japn, Madagascar, and US localities too, e.g, Illinois, Iowa...  

Archaeology Find: Lost Army of Cambyses II

From via Geology.com:

Archaeologists may have found the “Lost Army of Cambyses II” that perished in the Egyptian desert at about 500 BC.

Looking for ESCONI Volunteers

Hi ESCONI Members!

The club needs helps in two areas.

CIRCULATION (Board Position): Oversee the printing and shipping of the ESCONI newsletter and attend ESCONI board meetings. 

FIELD TRIP (Non-Board Position): Oversee the ESCONI sponsored Mazon Collecting field trip for one or more days. 

Earth Science Week Newsletter

The Earth Science Week Newsletter for August, 2012 is here.  Ideas for Earth Science Week (October 14-20, 2012) and other interesting information. 

Rock Show This Weekend In South Bend, IN

Michiana Gem & Mineral Society's 49th Annual Jewelry, Gem & Mineral Show. South Bend, IN, 

Friday 2-7 pm * Saturday 10-6 pm * Sunday 10-4 pm

St Joseph County 4-H Fairgrounds
Esther Singer Building
5177 South Ironwood Road
(Ironwood and Jackson Road)
South Bend, IN 46614

Adults: $3.00
Kids 6-12: $1.00
Under 6: FREE
Parking: FREE

*Quality Dealers
*Displays
*Demonstrations
*Kids Korner
*Door Prizes
*Silent Auction
*Exhibits and more!


 

ESCONI Events for September, 2012

September 2012

Fri -Sat. 9/ 7-9	36th Annual Greater Indianapolis Gem, Mineral and Fossil Show, Greenfield Indiana
Sat. 9/8	ESCONI Mineralogy Meeting7:30 p.m. College of Dupage, NOTE: Room Change! - Tech Ed  (TEC) Building, Room 1038A (Map) - Topic: Show & Tell
Fri. 9/14	ESCONI General Meeting 8:00 p.m. College of Dupage, TIP: Room Change! - Tech Ed (TEC) Building, Room 1038A (Map)Topic: Thomas Loebel will speak on, "Ice Age Hunters and Illinois Clovis Point Survey" NOTE: We are looking for volunteers to help run the ESCONI Mazon Creek Field Trips and to do the newsletter circulation. If you are interested, talk with John Good or Karen Nordquist at the meeting.
Sat. 9/15	1. Saturday - ESCONI Field Trip - Belvidiere IL - see web page for more details 2. Rock and Mienral Swap - 6219 Forest Hills Road ~ Rockford, Illinois, Odd Fellows Hall,  Bring it, Swap it, Buy it, Sell it - 9:30 am to 3:00 pm 3. ESCONI Paleontology Meeting 7:30 p.m. College of Dupage, NOTE: Room Change! - Tech Ed Building (TEC), Room 1038A (Map)Topic: Show & Tell
Sat. 9/22	Archaeology Study Group Meeting. 7:30 p.m. College of Dupage,NOTE: Room Change! - Tech Ed Building (TEC), Room 1038A. (Map)Show and Tell.

Dinosaur Prints Found at NASA Space Center

From NBC News: (hat tip Floyd)

The folks at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center usually find curious things in the skies -- not in their backyard.

This summer they uncovered not one, but two dinosaur tracks on the Goddard campus in Greenbelt, Md.

The U.S. Geological Survey confirmed the find Thursday.  It’s believed the creatures that left the footprints were nodosaurs...

 

Pumice Raft the Size of a Country

Via The Australian:

.... AN undersea volcanic eruption has created a raft of porous volcanic rock in the Pacific Ocean that's larger than the surface area of Israel, but navy officers say the phenomenon is not a danger to shipping....     

Mars Geology Photographs

From Geology Rocks! by CNET:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS)

New Field Trip for Sept. 15

There will be an ESCONI field trip to the Irene Quarry near Belvidere, Illinois on Saturday, Sept 15, 2012, from 9AM to 2PM.

 

This is a new collecting location for an ESCONI field trip. The rock is Ordovician, but I'm not sure if it is Galena or Platteville. This is likely to be a "hard-rock" quarry (limestone or dolostone), not shale like Vulcan. The site is owned by William Charles Construction.

 

Rules (you knew there had to be some)

 

1. MUST be an ESCONI member as of August 17, 2012.

 

2. MUST be at least 18 years of age.

 

3. Sign up by sending me an email with the number of members attending and their names. My email is fossil54@att.net

    No phone calls, please.

 

4. I will acknowledge by return email. If you don't get a reply in 24 hours, send it again.

 

5. Maximum attendance is 30. I will keep a signup list (up to 30) and a waiting list (about 10) in case of cancellations.

 

6. Wear the usual clothing and equipment for being in a quarry. No sandals, no claw hammers, etc.

 

    MSHA Part 46 training is not required.

 

    The address of the quarry is 4525 Irene Road, Belvidere, Illinois. A picture of the quarry

    can be found at http://www.williamcharlesconstruction.com/Materials/Portfolio-Irene.aspx

    I recommend you get a map and directions from the Internet. I can send a small map

    if you can't get one directly. There appears to be an exit from Interstate 90 at

    Irene Rd, but no entrance back onto the interstate.

 

    I will distribute the release form to those signed up by email just before the trip.

 

    Questions? Send me an email...

 

    Dave

Armchair Archaeology

Via HuffPo:

... Armchair archeologists rejoice! A researcher may have made an exciting discovery using Google Earth, a program that allows users to navigate satellite images of the world on their personal computers.

Sky News reports that archeology researcher Angela Micol has identified two sites that could show never-before-seen ancient pyramids in Egypt....

 

Newstory about Fossils at Canadian/US Border

Odd newstory via The Detroit News:

... Inspectors with U.S. Customs and Border Protection stopped a pair of Canadian citizens at the Ambassador Bridge looking to cross into Detroit on March 28, 2011. The pair claimed to be on their way to a tradeshow in Illinois where they planned to exhibit the 1,100 fossils they had packed in boxes in their vehicle.

Border officials dug a little deeper and discovered the fossils were actually going to be sold in the U.S. — something the Canadians had not disclosed. The failure to declare goods for sale resulted in federal officials seizing the fossils.

"This interception is an excellent example of CBP's commitment to our ports of entry to the surrounding community," said Roderick Blanchard, Detroit Port director, in a statement released Friday. "CBP not only stopped the illegal entry, but was able to contribute to the University of Michigan."...

Explosion of New Dinosaur Species Out of Utah

From FoxNews:

... "Western North America has been a hotbed for dinosaur discoveries for more than a century, but the recent explosion of new dinosaur species coming out of Utah is sending waves through the paleontological community and revolutionized our understanding of dinosaur evolution on the continent," researcher Lindsay Zanno said in a statement. Zanno is the director of the Paleontology and Geology Research Laboratory at the Nature Research Center of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. 

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/08/06/dinosaur-boom-linked-to-rise-rocky-mountains/#ixzz236cEP4b7

 

Drones For Geology

Via Geology.com from USGS:

... The Lower Brule Sioux Tribe estimates that the Reservation is losing approximately 8 feet of shoreline per year in some locations along the Missouri River in South Dakota. USGS will monitor the erosion using unmanned flights....

Correlation Between Earthquakes and Fracking

Via R&D:

... Most earthquakes in the Barnett Shale region of North Texas occur within a few miles of one or more injection wells used to dispose of wastes associated with petroleum production such as hydraulic fracturing fluids, according to new research from The University of Texas at Austin. None of the quakes identified in the two-year study were strong enough to pose a danger to the public.

The study by Cliff Frohlich, senior research scientist at the university’s Institute for Geophysics, appears this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"You can't prove that any one earthquake was caused by an injection well," says Frohlich. "But it's obvious that wells are enhancing the probability that earthquakes will occur."

Plate Tectonics on Mars

Via PhysOrg:

...For years, many scientists had thought that plate tectonics existed nowhere in our solar system but on Earth. Now, a UCLA scientist has discovered that the geological phenomenon, which involves the movement of huge crustal plates beneath a planet's surface, also exists on Mars.... 

"Mars is at a primitive stage of plate tectonics. It gives us a glimpse of how the early Earth may have looked and may help us understand how plate tectonics began on Earth," said An Yin, a UCLA professor of Earth and space sciences and the sole author of the new research. Yin made the discovery during his analysis of satellite images from a NASA spacecraft known as THEMIS (Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms) and from the HIRISE (High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. He analyzed about 100 satellite images — approximately a dozen were revealing of plate tectonics...."