Most Recent Program Information
March 2019 Program
Club member Marcia Morris went on a week long expedition to Morocco and gave an interesting talk about her adventures there.Morocco contains the Atlas Mountains, an arid region occupied mostly by the Berbers.
Part of the area has evidence of the ancient trade routes to Algeria.
The area has pre-Cambrian to Cenozoic fossils and rock formations, with eroded mountain ridges, basaltic flows, and river beds.
The scenery was breath-taking and included multi-shaded grays, browns, yellows, pinks & reds on the desert floor and dunes, as well as on the mountain slopes.
Her geode samples were red & teal colored – beautiful!
Trilobites were everywhere and Marcia collected many samples just by walking around and picking them up!
She saw many fossils that were too large to collect, but had a large Septarian nodule and several stromatolites and ammonites.
Ichnofossils (calcified ant burrows) and lopoliths (bulbous crinoids) were prevalent there.
She visited a fossil museum as well, and saw a factory where the native people make everything from small decorative items to counter tops from orthoceras (squid-like) fossils.
Marcia was impressed with the guides who led them on “roads” that were no more than invisible (to her) paths through the desert, and opted out of riding the domestic camels. (There are no wild ones found there any more.)
Thank you, Marcia for sharing your collection & photos! See her geode and scenery pics below.
