Author Archives: Mark Wilson

About Mark Wilson

Mark Wilson is an emeritus Professor of Geology at The College of Wooster. He specializes in invertebrate paleontology, carbonate sedimentology, and stratigraphy. He also is an expert on pseudoscience, especially creationism.

Wooster Geologists begin the 2011-2012 school year

WOOSTER, OHIO–The cheerful group above is the Wooster Geology Club in our traditional start of the year group photograph. (The image was kindly taken by Danielle Reeder.) We are fewer than usual because an unprecedented number of our geology majo… Continue reading

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Wooster’s Fossil of the Week: A Biserial Graptolite (Middle Ordovician of Tennessee)

This week’s fossils are graptolites (from the Greek for written rocks) I found many years ago in the Lebanon Limestone near the town of Caney Springs south of Nashville, Tennessee. They are of the genus Amplexograptus and probably belong to … Continue reading
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Wooster’s Fossil of the Week: A trilobite hypostome (Upper Ordovician of southern Ohio)

We had a familiar trilobite last week, so this week we’ll look at a poorly-known part of a trilobite: the hypostome. Above is an incomplete forked, conterminant hypostome of the large trilobite Isotelus. (Isotelus, by the way, is the state &#8230… Continue reading

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Wooster’s Fossil of the Week: A trilobite (Middle Cambrian of Utah)

I’ve avoided having a  trilobite as Fossil of the Week because it seems like such a cliché. Everyone knows trilobites, and they are the most common “favorite fossil” (invertebrate, anyway). Plus our best trilobite (seen above) is th… Continue reading

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Using the iPad in museum work

COLUMBUS, OHIO–Earlier this summer my colleagues and I had blog posts describing how we use our iPads in geological fieldwork (with examples from the limestones of Estonia to the basalts of Iceland). Today I used my iPad2 during work in … C… Continue reading

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Wooster’s Fossils of the Week: barnacle borings (Middle Jurassic of Israel)

Tiny little trace fossils this week in a Jurassic crinoid stem from the Matmor Formation of the Negev Desert. They are borings produced by barnacles, which are sedentary crustaceans more typically found in conical shells of their own making. These &#82… Continue reading

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Wooster’s Fossil of the Week: A Conulariid (Lower Carboniferous of Indiana)

I have some affection for these odd fossils, the conulariids. When I was a student in the Invertebrate Paleontology course taught Dr. Richard Osgood, Jr., I did my research paper on them. I had recently found a specimen in the … Continue reading
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Wooster’s Fossil of the Week: An edrioasteroid (Upper Ordovician of Kentucky)

This week’s fossil appeared previously in this blog when we discussed hiatus concretions and their fossil fauna. It is one of my favorites for both how we found it (see the entry linked above) and the way it introduced me … Continue reading… Continue reading

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Wooster’s Fossil of the Week: Pelican’s-foot snail (Pliocene of Cyprus)

This week’s fossil was found on the same 1996 Keck Geology Expedition to Cyprus that produced the Thorny Oyster highlighted in January. Stephen Dornbos (’97) was there, but this fossil was not part of the Pliocene coral reef complex he &#82… Continue reading

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Exploring the Silurian at the Naturhistoriska Riksmuseet in Stockholm: Last day of work for the Wooster Geology Estonia Team

STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN–No paleontological expedition is complete until it includes time in the collections of a museum. No single sampling trip like ours can describe the full diversity of a fossil site, no matter how many days we spend scouring the &… Continue reading

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