petrified wood

How many attendees does it take to make a great field trip?  Today, the answer was four!  Maybe it was the cold weather or maybe it was schedule conflicts but, for the folks who came to Chilton County for the field trip, it was very pleasant!

The water in the creek was a little high and was a LOT COLD but that didn’t stop the BPS members who wanted to look for petrified and permineralized wood specimens.  The summer drought has kept several sites from the usual surface material turnover so the larger specimens of petrified wood were not evident.  Smaller samples were plentiful and the colors and visible petrified wood grain that were seen were beautiful, as usual.  Two spectacular Native American artifacts were found as well. 

Some interesting local fauna was seen:  a busy beaver (seemingly unconcerned by our presence), a pair of racing kingfishers, following the creek and chattering loudly, and a small flock of guinea fowl by the fishing lake.  There were tiny minnows in the creek – wonder how they feel about the temperature change?? In spite of the cooler temps, their location is one of the best.  We were fortunate to share their space for the day!!