Adventurous Challenge

Go fossiling for one hour and take what you find to a local gem shop to identify them.

There are various coastlines, quarries and even farm land around the world where fossils can be found and completing this challenge means going to find one of them. This challenge can be rewarding but equally frustrating. You need good eyesight and patience. The best place to find fossils is in sedimentary rocks, such as limestone and sandstone, which have been exposed. To remove the fossils you don’t need specialised fossil tools; a chisel can be replaced by a butter knife. Once you have a small collection, try to identify what it was – this can be done using a book or website but if there is a local gen shop near by seek their advice.

Amy completed this challenge in Cromer, on the beach of East Runton (known for its fossils). When reflecting on the challenge she said:

“I love fossils and gemstones and have done for as long as I can remember. So, when my mum and I were challenged to go fossiling for a whole hour on the coast of East Runton, it didn’t seem like a challenge to me. We had a great time chipping away at different rocks and hearing each other’s excited squeals of, ‘I’ve got one!’ every time something interesting appeared. I wasn’t very lucky when it came to finding the fossils (or I wasn’t looking hard enough!) but found some sharp bits of flint, a piece of what we thought was a gem stone – but turned out to be a bit of pottery – and one unusual fossil. But the challenge wasn’t just to find a few fossils – we had to go to a gem shop in Cromer, Little Gem, and identify the fossils and various artifacts we found. The lady there was extremely helpful. The most interesting thing we found was a mineral and some common Norfolk fossilised squid.”

Find out about Family Challenge(d) here: http://www.dotrythisathome.com/family-challenged/