Birmingham Paleontological Society

The Sea Monsters exhibit that opened at McWane Science Center on October 5, 2007 took many months of hard work by McWane Science Center employees and others. One afternoon of this months-long effort was captured on film, and is presented here for your enjoyment.

The new "Sea Monsters" exhibit opened October 5th at McWane Science Center and will run until sometime in the spring. BPS members and other friends of McWane Science Center were treated to a preview of the exhibit on October 4th, showcasing the paleontology department's new "ocean" exhibit featuring life size casts of Protostega (turtle), Clidastes (mosasaur),

The fossil exhibit Sea Monsters is opening at McWane Science Center October 5, 2007.

In addition a new IMAX movie from National Geographic titled Sea Monsters, will also open at McWane October 5. Many of the creatures on exhibit are showcased in this IMAX movie.

Members of the Birmingham Paleontological Society held a fossil exhibit at the Homewood Public Library from September 1 until September 30. On Sunday,

A trip to a quarry in the Mississippian age, Fort Payne chert was on the schedule for BPS' field trip in September. It was a beautiful day with a good turnout. THe quarry had been dug out since out last visit so we were able to look around the freshly-exposed areas. Sylvie and Michael made a heroic effort to find a trilobite in some of the material that resembled Frog Mtn. formation, but to no avail. We wandered freely over the huge quarry area, finding crinoid stems, brachiopods, corals and a number of nice geodes.

BPS regular monthly meetings are held on the 1st Monday of each month at the McWane Science Center.

Program: Discussion and slideshow led by Greg Mestler on the theses - Ingersoll shale Lagerstatte written by Sean Bingham and Terry Knight.  Visit to see paleo lab and new exhibits being installed.

Park in the deck on "Level C", go through doors marked Special Event Center, and follow signs to meeting. The business meeting begins at 7:00, followed by the program around 7:45 or 8pm.

A trip to a non-working mine site to explore spoil piles for invertebrate fossils was on the menu for BPS's August field trip. The mining company, headquartered in Tuscaloosa county generously offered us the opportunity to explore at this site. A long, hot day on a moonscape was nevertheless a great trip, yielding some beautiful specimens.

We met with the mining engineer who gave us a quick overview of the mining operations, then let us go onto the piles to do our hunting. We hunted until the heat got to us and it was time to seek air-conditioning.