upcoming meetings & events

The Section held its final meeting before the summer break on Tuesday June 4. This wjoint Fossil and Mineral picnic at the RAS Astronomy Section’s Farash Center at Ionia, NY, and featured the election of officers for the 2023 – 2024 term.

Fossil Section Meeting.   Our speaker was Dr. James Boyle, Assistant Teaching Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Geological Sciences Department at SUNY Buffalo.  This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here,  “A victim of its own Success—The armored fish Dunkleosteus terrelli.”  Dr. Boyle’s research interests focus on the paleobiology of arthrodire placoderms, a diverse group of armored fishes which abruptly went extinct at the end of Devonian Period and on using the fossil record to study patterns of extinction while determining which features of species are most strongly correlated with the risk of extinction.  Doing this requires being able to place the timing of events in geologic time precisely and his research involves developing automated biostratigraphic techniques.

Fossil Section Meeting.    At our April 2 meeting we have a talk by RAS Member Dr. George McIntosh, emeritus Curator of Paleontology at the Rochester Museum & Science Center.  Dr. McIntosh is a life-long researcher on crinoids and has numerous publications on these starfish relatives.  This is an expansion on a short talk he gave at last year’s Subcommission on Devonian Stratigraphy (SDS) meeting at SUNY Geneseo.  This talk will be recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here,  Late Devonian crinoid ghost lineages.

These are referred to as “ghost lineages” because there is a long gap of time (~25 million years) between many of the genera found in Middle Devonian rock and when their descendants are found in the Carboniferous, during which no fossils of the intermediate forms have ever been found. We know that they lived in the intervening time, but we have no examples.

Fossil Section Meeting.   Our key note speaker at the March 5, 2023 Samuel J. Ciurca, Jr. Memorial Lectures meeting of the Rochester Academy of  Science FOSSIL SECTION was  Dr. James C. Lamsdell, Department of Geology and Geography, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV.  

  Dr. Lamsdell provided the following abstract. Eurypterids are ancient, extinct aquatic arthropods known from over 250 species, that formed important components of Paleozoic ecosystems and have an evolutionary history ranging from the Middle Ordovician (467 mya) to the late Permian (254 mya). Eurypterids are charismatic fossils, counting among their number the official state fossil for New York (Eurypterus) and the largest known arthropod (Jaekelopterus).  This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, From catfish to crustaceans to chelicerates: eurypterids at 200(ish).

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Fossil Section Meeting.    At our March 5 meeting we had our second annual Samuel J. Ciurca, Jr. Memorial Lectures. Our first speaker was Dr. Derek Briggs, the G. Evelyn Hutchinson Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Yale University and Curator-in-Charge of Invertebrate Fossils at the Yale Peabody Museum.  “Sam Ciurca’s collection from the Silurian Bertie Group includes more than remarkable eurypterids.  Notable are a couple of rare problematic fossils, forms that proved difficult to place in any living group. Sam referred to the first as Ezekiel’s Wheel and dubbed the best specimen ‘the most beautiful fossil ever found’. The second is a large disc-like fossil up to 17 cm across. The search for details finally resolved the nature of these two mystery fossils.”  This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here,  “Ciurca’s curious creatures.”  

Our speaker this month was Dr. Kristina Curry Rogers, vertebrate paleontologist and the DeWitt Wallace Professor in Biology and Geology at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota and past Chair of the Biology Department. This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, “The Unlikely (but Very Lucky!) Triumph of Dinosaurs.”  Dr. Rogers is a leading authority on dinosaur paleobiology and evolution.   She specializes in sauropods, which were the long-necked dinosaurs such as Brachiosaurusand Diplodocus, with a particular interest in the titanosaurs.  

 Our speaker was Dr. D. Jeffery Over, Distinguished Professor of Geological Sciences at SUNY Geneseo. This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here “The Devonian of New York: Overview and guide to future research." Dr. Over is one of the editors and contributors to this definitive revision of Devonian stratigraphy published by the Paleontological Research Institution in mid-2023 after years of work.  

Our speaker was Dr. Thomas Hegna, Associate Professor in the Department of Geology and Environmental Sciences at SUNY Fredonia.   This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, “Tales Told by Trilobites.”  

He sent the following: “Trilobites are one of the most charismatic representatives of the Paleozoic. They lived for over 250 million years all over the globe. Trilobites are a part of the great experiment of life that has already been completed. I highlight ways, from current research, that trilobites have taught us new things about diversity, growth, fossilization, and even technology.  Studies I relate contain anecdotes both from my own research, and the research of other paleontologists over the last two decades.” 

The Section held its final meeting before the summer break on Tuesday June 7. This marked the return of our joint Fossil and Mineral picnic at the RAS Astronomy Section’s Farash Center at Ionia, NY, and featured the election of officers for the 2022 – 2023 term.

Fossil Section Meeting.    At our April 4 meeting we had a talk by member Gerry Kloc on his Silurian trilobites from Illinois and Missouri.   This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here,  Silurian Trilobites from Missouri and Southern Illinois.  

We also had a short presentation by Jonathan Hendricks of the Paleontological Research Institution to discuss their planned Museum of the Earth exhibits and activities in conjunction with this year’s very important publication of the Devonian of New York treatise by the Devonian Stratigraphic Sub-commission.  This talk was also recorded and can be viewed at Year of Devonian at PRI.

Fossil Section Meeting.    At our March 7 meeting we had the first of our annual Samuel J. Ciurca, Jr. Memorial Lectures. Our speaker was Dr. Derek Briggs, the G. Evelyn Hutchinson Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Yale University and Curator-in-Charge of Invertebrate Fossils at the Yale Peabody Museum.   Work on Sam Ciurca’s collections is ongoing at the YPMNH and they will continue to be a major resource for researchers in the future.  This talk presents some of Sam's remarkable discoveries and considers the importance of his contributions to paleontology    This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, The Remarkable Fossils from Sam Ciurca’s Eurypterid Collection.

Fossil Section Meeting.   Our speaker at the February 7, 2023 meeting of the Rochester Academy of  Science FOSSIL SECTION was Dr. Matt Friedman, Associate Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science at the University of Michigan and Director at the UM Museum of Paleontology.   Although the Devonian is often popularly called “The Age of Fish,” this is a misnomer. Fish were not more populous than today nor more dominant nor more diverse at that time. Dr. Friedman reviewed important steps in the evolution of ray-finned fishes with a focus on the Devonian/ Carboniferous and in the late Cretaceous/early Cenozoic.  This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, The Ages of Fishes.

Fossil Section Meeting. This talk at the November 8, 2022 meeting of the Rochester Academy of  Science FOSSIL SECTION celebrated one of the most influential  naturalists of the 19th and early 20th centuries—Henry Augustus  Ward–whose impact on shaping natural history museum collections and  helping found many of today’s museums worldwide was immeasurable and  whose legacy remains relevant today.  Our speaker was  Dr. Robert Minckley, Professor of Instruction at the University of Rochester.  This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, Rochester and the birth of natural history museums; Ward’s Natural Science Establishment before 1900.

The October section meeting ass on Tuesday, October 4, at 7:30 PM. 

Our speaker was Dr. Lisa Amati, the New York State Paleontologist.  This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, “New York’s Finest Fossils.”  Take a virtual trip with her around New York State visiting some of the most impressive fossil localities.  From Neoproterozoic stromatolites to the oldest fossil forest, this talk gives an overview of the famous fossils for which New York is known. Several specimens were on hand for viewing.

The Section held its final meeting before the summer break on Tuesday June 7. This marked the return of our joint Fossil and Mineral picnic at the RAS Astronomy Section’s Farash Center at Ionia, NY, and featured the election of officers for the 2022 – 2023 term.

  The Section had a field trip on 5/21 to the upper Devonian sites near Tioga PA. The site is just over the border in PA near the Tioga welcome center on the old route 15 replacement. The site exposes Upper Devonian (upper Frasnian) sandstones and siltstones which the Section rarely collects in and the fauna consists primarily of brachiopods and bivalves. This is a hammer and chisel site consisting of large road cuts located well off the roads

Our speaker was section member Michael Grenier.  Michael discussed the researches published over the past two years in dinosaur paleontology.  He is a Cretaceous specialist with many summers experience in the field, and is a long-time member of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.  This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, Dinosaur Research in 2020 & 2021: Eggs, Babies, Feathers, Other Amazing Finds, & the Really, Really Bad Day. 

OUR FIRST LIVE PROGRAM IN TWO YEARS!  Our Speaker was Dr. Pennilyn Higgins, speaking on Paleontology at the End of the Rope.  Natural Trap Cave is an 80-foot-deep pit in the Bighorn Mountains, in northern Wyoming,  which provides important paleontological information on the North  American Late Pleistocene dating from 20,000 years ago, due to a rich  layer of fossils from animals that became trapped in the cave.   This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, Paleontology at the End of the Rope.

Our speaker was Dr. Sara H. Burch, Associate Professor, SUNY Geneseo speaking on the biomechanics of the Theropod forelimb, including T. rex.  This talk was recorded and can be viewed on our private YouTube channel here, Forelimb Function in Predatory Dinosaurs.

NOTE: No meeting in January.  Our speaker this meeting is Dr. Christopher Berry discussing his research on the Devonian forests at Gilboa and Cairo,NY and others at  Svalbard island off Norway and near  near Xinhang in China.  Dr. Berry will be connected from his location in Cardiff, Wales.  This talk was recorded.  To get access, you must write to paleo@frontier.com and sign a release.

Road Cuts Near Tioga, PA Field Trip.   A series of large road cuts near Tioga, PA exposes Upper Devonian strata. The rock is primarily siltstone and sandstone and contains a fauna of brachiopods and bivalves. These sites were visited during the 2017 New York State Geological Association annual meeting in 2017