inyo
noticing nice landscape pebbles
Member since September 2014
Posts: 85
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Post by inyo on Nov 18, 2014 20:04:02 GMT -5
Over at Video Visit To Sharktooth Hill is an archival "California's Gold" segment, originally telecast over affiliate Public Broadcasting System (PBS) stations throughout California on November 8, 2006, in which host Huell Howser (originally hailed from Tennessee, by the way) visits the world-famous middle Miocene Sharktooth Hill Bone Bed (roughly 15.9 to 15.2 million years old; yields the greatest concentration and largest assemblage of middle Miocene marine vertebrates in the world) in the foothills of the southern Sierra Nevada northeast of Bakersfield, California. Includes on-site, informative discussions regarding the famed bone bed with the late Bob Ernst, the former primary private land holder of beaucoup prime Sharktooth Hill Bone Bed territory, as well as a visit to nearby Buena Vista Museum in Bakersfield, one of the major repositories of abundant fossil material collected from the incomparable bone bed. My page: "A Visit To The Sharktooth Hill Bone Bed, Southern California" at inyo.coffeecup.com/site/sb/sharkbonebed.html .
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Post by jakesrocks on Nov 18, 2014 20:57:37 GMT -5
I was lucky enough to have dug Sharktooth Hill several times in the early 1950's, before restrictions were put on what could be removed from the hill by private collectors. It's a shame that the hill was turned into a limited pay to dig site, and that half of what people labor to dig out is now confiscated by the owners. If I wasn't too old to now dig at the hill, I would not go back to collect there. Why should I furnish my labor and money, just to enrich the collection of someone else ?
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,456
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Post by Sabre52 on Nov 19, 2014 10:04:52 GMT -5
Yeah, I used to dig there about once a year and also on the other side of the river too. Still have a couple of rikers of teeth that I give out to the kiddies. I actually have a Meg tooth I found one time too. The trip I remember most though, was one year we went out with guy from the Porterville club to a location way at the bottom of the formation across the river from Sharktooth Hill. The sandstone there was super tough and it was hard to remove chunks big enough to find teeth in. This guy was a really large fellow and we hadn't been there but for a few minutes with most us guys bitching about how hard the matrix was to work, when he knocked out a chunk of sandstone maybe eight inches wide. He turned it over and there was a perfect big "purple" Meg tooth. He turns and holds it up smiling and says, " Don't know what y'all are bitching about, this sharktooth hunting seems easy to me." From that time onward, any time he dug with us, he always carried that dang tooth around in a special shadow box just to tease us with *L*.
Really surprised no one in the video mentioned Valley Fever. it's really rampant up there and my best friend almost died from it. Still has a mass on his lung. If it's dry, you really have to wear a mask when digging in that region....Mel
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alan
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since December 2013
Posts: 111
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Post by alan on Nov 19, 2014 12:22:11 GMT -5
I think valley fever is a risk here in Texas too... I know a few ppl who dig artifacts in Central Texas who use heavy equipment to move tons of dirt... The spores can be mixed up in it..
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,456
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Post by Sabre52 on Nov 19, 2014 16:19:24 GMT -5
That is good to know Alan. I had not heard that before...Mel
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Henry
spending too much on rocks
Member since January 2013
Posts: 452
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Post by Henry on Nov 25, 2014 0:15:27 GMT -5
I love "California Gold"! Huell Howser R.I.P.
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