martinzoo

One of the projects that I did for GB while we were here was to make a small homemade fossil dig.
You’ll need:
- beach sand
- plaster of paris
- several objects to be “fossils.” These can be shells, bones or bits of wood
- a smooth sided, disposable,  container. I like using a large, plastic cup.
- a mixing bowl
- bamboo skewers or toothpicks and old tooth brushes
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Put enough sand into the cup to fill it 3/4 of the way full. Fill it the rest of the way with dry plaster. Pour the sand and plaster into the mixing bowl and stir it around to mix it. Add water to get a good pourable consistency.

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Put about an inch of the mixture back into the cup. Drop in one or two “fossils” and then add enough of the mixture to cover them. Add another “fossil” and then more mixture. Keep doing this until your container is full.

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Let the container sit overnight. The next day, the sand mixture should have hardened into a rock-like substance. Tear along the side of the cup to help you remove the ‘rock’.

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When you are digging real fossils, the rock is often as hard or harder than the fossils. This means that you must be very careful as you dig, so you do not damage the fossil. Paleontologists use a wide range of digging tools. Much of the digging is done with small, delicate tools, ranging from picks like the dentist uses to clean your teeth to pointed splints of bamboo to hammers and chisels, depending on the kind of rock that surrounds the fossil. Our “rock” is similar to a soft sandstone, so we will use bamboo skewers or toothpicks to scrape away the rock. Dig slowly and carefully to be sure that you do not miss anything or damage your fossils. Depending on how hard your “sandstone” is, it may take you anywhere from a few minutes to a couple of hours to excavate your finds.

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Even Gramma was working hard on her fossil. We spent a good hour or so on this project and it was really fun.

These were all of our finds. The mallets weren’t on my list of supplies, but I found them at the beach house and thought they’d be perfect for authenticating the dig atmosphere.

Good times!

I found this Fossil Glossary on the internet at the Utah State Office of Education