(Image: Paul McDevitt)
Tales of the stony turd industry
WE MENTIONED recently that the New Mexico Museum of Natural History has devoted a whole issue of its Bulletin to the subject of coprolites – aka fossilised faeces (8 December 2012). This reminded Michael Ghirelli of the time he spent studying the geology around Shillington, a small village in Bedfordshire, UK.
Michael informs us – and we must warn you that things get scatological here – that: “Shillington was one of the foremost centres of the coprolite mining industry in England from the 18th century onwards. The word coprolite is Greek for…
