A few years ago I used to teach American classes that came to the University of Queensland. One evening my Stanford class had just arrived and I wandered over to their college accommodation to say Hello. I came across an odd sight – a knot… Read more
One of the plant fossils that turns up in New Zealand’s Jurassic rocks is a delicate-looking fern frond called Coniopteris (Arber, 1917; Edwards, 1934; see featured image). The well-known Jurassic fossil forest at Curio Bay (Pole 1999) would have had Coniopteris growing in it. And,… Read more
In the early 1980s when I was working on the Jurassic fossil forest of Curio Bay, near the bottom end of New Zealand’s South Island, it seemed clear that two main types of tree formed the forest canopy. There were two types of conifer foliage fossil around Curio… Read more
What a difference nearly thirty years makes. In 1986 the Prof of Geology at Otago University showed me some recently collected plant fossils and asked to me to “confirm they are Jurassic”. The fossils had been collected by Steve Cournane, while he was mapping for his… Read more
Easter, 1971. The family is holed-up in a tiny home-made caravan at Cole Creek, in New Zealand’s forest-clad South Westland just north of Haast. It’s bucketing-down. We’re there because our Dad has an infatuation with finding the missing backpack of a murdered woman, Jennifer Beard.… Read more
One of the endearing memories I have during my PhD was working on the banks above the Kawarau River near Cromwell (Central Otago, New Zealand), in the middle of the winter. I was belting my way with a pick into a sequence of mud that… Read more
One of the endearing memories I have during my PhD was working on the banks above the Kawarau River near Cromwell (Central Otago, New Zealand), in the middle of the winter. I was belting my way with a pick into a sequence of mud that… Read more
The first time I ever slept-out (sleeping bag, no tent), I was about four years old, and the place was an idyllic spot on the banks of Pipson Creek, just outside of Makarora. Its on the road to the West Coast from Wanaka/Hawea. One of… Read more
The lowlands south of Dunedin (New Zealand), used to be almost impassable wetlands. The local Maoris were incredulous when the first Western explorers of the mid 19th century insisted on making their way tediously directly through it. There were other routes south. The wetlands were… Read more