CompuServe Messages

John, the crabs come from coastal Miocene deposits in Washington State on the Peninsula, near Port Angeles. Yes, I collected them myself, away from noted sites. Happened to pay attention to the sediments along the beach, saw the concretions, picked them up, took 'em home. As with most concretions, a hearty tap usually parts the fossil on lines of cleavage guaranteed to leave half in each piece. The rest is merely (g) gently chipping away at that which is not a fossil. I use a Foredom flexible shaft with a percussion handpiece for the gross work, liberal use of dilute HCL to loosen the matrix, and a multitude of dental picks, custom made picks and chisels round out the repetoire. I have about 38 hours in the crab I'm working on now, it goes to Jerry in trade for some Devonian stuff. These concretions are *tough*. The crab is bout 3cm across the carapace, which is mostly exposed now. The legs and claws will take a bit of care. Michael