The
opening Tibetan music and photos on this webpage are dedicated in memorium to
geologist Geoff Oakes who was a colleague of those members of LachlanHunter
who worked formerly for the state government of NSW (Geological Survey).
Before his passing Geoff developed an interest in Tibet/buddhism and for long
he had a great love of mountains. He always liked to get away to those
snowy mountains found down in southern NSW. Message from
Geoff: "So, dear family and friends, I'm away ... and that will
give me a chance to plan a welcome for you all on the other side ...
Light a candle for me ... On my birthday, have a glass of red. Cheers,
Geoff."
This website was c
ommenced Jan 29,
2006
-- It is maintained by John (contact john.mail "at" ozemail.com.au)
for LachlanHunter Associates and friends.
Contributions, information and your ideas or queries are always welcome and please
send. LachlanHunter was formed specifically to encourage
information sharing by professionals (in earth science and prehistory) who have
worked in the Lachlan or Hunter regions of New South Wales. However,
anyone can join or associate with us in some form or another - just email if
your are
These web pages may be wide-ranging in places but do have some overall focus on the
Lachlan-Sydney-Hunter regions of New South Wales.
LACHLANHUNTER
ASSOCIATES include geologists who have been mainly working in NSW. We also
have one archaeologist member. We welcome enquiries and please see the bottom of this page for
precisely who best to contact on
any particular topics. Or else go to links found at the right hand side of
each person's photo to get their contact address, notes on current interests, publications,
biography, etc. We may also slowly profile other geologists (and geological organisations) - who are they and what do
they do, besides ourselves; so if you have a story for us or some snippets
that might be added to these pages please send it to us on CD-ROM, or floppy
disk, at:
LachlanHunter
Associates
P.O.
Box 121,
BURWOOD,
NSW 1805
Australia
We
are pleased to facilitate geological employment where possible - If you are a beginning student
wanting vacation work, or one about to graduate and soon to be wanting
full time work, or a retiring geoscientist still interested in perhaps
doing some part time or occasional work, please send us your CV/profile.
Email it to John john.mail "at" ozemail.com.au. Of if you are
anyone looking to employ geologist services please send us your needs.
We also know of, or can engage in, one-to-one assistance in career change for
those who may be interested in changing from private to public sector
employment.
If you wish to
consider employing any of us
to do any of the things we do best, look for the individuals' pages as these
contain direct contact details. This is found via the links at the right hand side
of photos - please contact the relevant person
directly. Billing for any services is direct, not via LachlanHunter in
any way (LachlanHunter is not a commercial entity). It does however look
for funding to help carry on or promote the interests indicated in these
pages in a non-profit making manner. We generally promote community/individual interest in geology and the
study/preservation and appreciation of the past.
Otherwise
just read on about the origin of things, about GEOLOGICAL TIME and
preserving the memories of the earth (with a little interpretation of course).
We respect the earth, and geological time. And the more one takes the
time to investigate the fullness of geological time the bigger it all seems,
and the more we appreciate all who have gone before and who have already
worked out little bits of it for us. Little by little, by correlating
the rock strata and the types of life forms preserved in them the geologists
of a couple of centuries back began piecing together the geological time scale
and naming the periods we now use.
The earth is
old ...
Bare geology
abounds - go visit some ...
And everything has
an origin, not always easy to discern - but the stones do tell stories.
GEOLOGICAL
TIME
and
PROCESSES
(Millions
of Years; Myriad Memories)
DIVIDING
GEOLOGICAL TIME
The
geological or deep
time of Earth's past has been organized into various units
according to events which took place in each period. Different spans of
time on the time scale have been delimited according to major geological
or palaeontological discoveries, such as mass
extinctions. Older periods which predate the reliable fossil record
are defined by absolute age.
WE
ARE HERE
(at the Holocene epoch in geological time)
The above timescale image in one of many ways of illustrating geological
time. For others that have been used see Associate Professor Stephen S. Gao's
lecture course GEOL100 "Earth in Action" (at Kansas State University, Manhattan
- Full listing).
Or click here for more about the geological time scale.
In the
three below scales, the second and third ones are each subsections of
their preceding timeline as indicated by asterisks.
Millions
of Years
The Holocene
(the latest epoch)
and the Present (from 1950 to now) are too small to be shown clearly on
this timeline.
The
choice of the year 1950 to define the commencement of the Present
(origin
year for the BP scale) is because it is the year in which calibration
curves for radiocarbon dating were established. It predates the
large scale atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons which altered the
global ratio of carbon-14 to carbon-12.
The
following is another presentation of the time scale, this one accentuating
climatic alternations.
Geological
chronology - From David Johnston's "The Geology of Australia",
Cambridge University Press, 2004.
The
extinction at 251 million years ago, sometimes referred to as the Great
Dying, is the largest in the
geological
record.
THE
MORE RECENT EARTH HISTORY - THE AGES OF HOMINIDS
3.2 million BC
'Lucy' lived. An upright-walking hominid, Lucy became man's oldest discovered ancestor
by almost 1m years when her skeleton was uncovered in Hadar,
Ethiopia, in 1974.
Then
later on a
stunningly complete skeleton of a three-year-old girl who lived 3.3
million years was uncovered in Ethiopia in 2006. This tiny female was
a child belonging to this ancestral pre-human species called Australopithecus
afarensis, the same species as the iconic fossil specimen Lucy
belongs to. Their kind lived in East Africa 3 million to 4 million
years ago. Modern humankind, by comparison, is thought to have
arisen only 200,000 years
ago.
1 million BC
Beginning of the Pleistocene era, a time of huge climatic change
During this epoch, vast ice sheets advanced and retreated four times over
the Earth's mountainous areas and northerly latitudes. Humans began to
migrate out of Africa, from where it is widely believed they originated,
and into Europe and Asia towards the end of the epoch.
Mammoths popularly signify the
conditions of the Ice Ages.
In
the Neander Valley ('Neandertal' in German), in the summer of 1856,
quarrymen discovered the fossilised remains of a skeleton - which has
since achieved world-wide fame as Neanderthal man. Today the
Neanderthal Museum is found on this legendary site. The museum tells
the story of human evolution and since its opening in 1996 has had more
than 170,000 visitors annually (After 10 years more than 1.8 million
have visited
the displays).
A total of twelve
life-sized figures were specially sculpted for the Museum.
Representing actual anthropological discoveries, they were created
using skull castings and the latest techniques in forensic
medicine.
This
cousin of modern humans died out nearly 30,000 years ago. The
oldest fossilised primate protein to have been sequenced, taken from a
Neanderthal was found to be identical to the Homo sapiens
equivalent (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, DOI:
10.1073/pnas.0500450102).
>
50,000 BC
Sharpening
stone axes by grinding on sandstone. (Photo: Man before history by John
Waechter)
Using axes to cut out shield wood. (Photo: Australian Museum, Dick collection)
Man arrives in Australia. Aboriginal group memory of the beginning of
things - the Dreaming - does not to contextualise any arrival on the
continent whereas archaeologists do envisage, and try to determine, some
arrival point. They currently think that human occupation of Australia
dates back at least 60,000 years.
The first
'oldest known' pieces of stone
taken to be artefacts were found in deposits of the Nepean
River at Castlereagh, in gravels still not dated with great certainty but likely 40-80 Ka old (best estimate 40-47 ka
BP, cf. Nanson et al.
1987; Stockton 1979, p.52; Stockton & Holland 1974, p.65). As little further was found there
in situ,
later interest shifted elsewhere in search of the oldest traces or
remains, particularly to the Willandra
Lakes area in western NSW. Well known early traces of human
presence (30-40 ka) are at Lake Mungo and Cuddie Springs.
Many believe that humans first arrived in Australia in simple craft from
Southeast Asia, during a time when sea level was lower and the dividing
sea narrower. A cave site at Jerimalai in East Timor where people lived more
than 42,000 years ago, eating turtles, tuna and giant rats, was
excavated by Sue O'Connor, head of archaeology and natural history at
the Australian National University. Sea levels were lower when
modern humans set off around the coast from Africa more than 70,000
years ago. People who made it to the large South-East Asian land mass
known as Sunda, however, still had to cross deep ocean channels to get
to Australia, then joined to Papua New Guinea in a continent called
Sahul. She was confident Jerimalai's inhabitants were Homo sapiens, and
not small-brained members of Homo floresiensis, because of the
evidence for their sophisticated behaviour found in the dig. The
find, however, raised big questions, such as why modern humans appeared
to have bypassed Flores on their way to Timor. One possibility was
that the 'hobbits' (Homo floresiensis)were able to repel them.
(Source:
http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/timor-cave-may-reveal-how-humans-reached-australia/2006/12/21/1166290679167.html
Around
60,000 BP Sydney's climate was cooler and drier. Sealevel was 30m
lower than now and the coastline some 2-3 km further east. A
pluvial period may have followed (40-60 ka ago), with the Nepean River at
Penrith depositing a major braided gravel sheet at that time.
20,000 BP
(Last Glacial Maximum)
Willandra Lakes footprints were made (see photos of these below)
The largest collection of Pleistocene-era footprints yet discovered,
they provide insights into the anatomy and behaviour of
hunter-gatherers.
The
last glacial period occurred between about 25,000 and 14,000 years
ago. During this time the climate was much colder and drier than
today. At the height or maximum of the last glaciation, about 18,000 years
ago, ice sheets covered areas of the Australian Alps and the sea-level
was perhaps 120 m lower than at present. Consequently the land
area was much larger: Australia, New Guinea and Tasmania were all part of
the one continent.
The
Last Glacial Maximum refers to the time of maximum extent of the ice sheets
during during the the Würm
or Wisconsin glaciation), approximately 20,000 years ago. The
extreme conditions persisted for probably two thousand years. Much of
Europe and North America was covered by thick ice sheets. In the
warmer regions of the world climate was also radically changed, becoming extremely
dry and generally cold. In extreme cases, such as did occur in South Australia, rainfall could be diminished by up to ninety percent, with
floras diminished to almost the same degree as in glaciated areas of Europe
and North America. Most of the world's deserts expanded, however in
the period immediately before the Last Glacial Maximum, many areas
that became completely barren desert were wetter than they are today,
notably in southern Australia where Aboriginal occupation may have expanded
during a wet period between 40,000 and 60,000 years BP.
34,000-17,000 BC
Fine
Art "arrives" - the wonderful Palaeolithic or Ice Age cave art
that depicts bears, horses, bison, lions, mammoths, rhinos and other
animals ....
The
Lascaux wall paintings in southwestern France were discovered in
1940. These cave paintings are thought to be one of the world's
first recorded narratives.
Photo:
Norbert Aujolat
Photo: Bulletin May
25 1999
Late Palaeolithic:
The beautiful lions of Grotte Chauvet (Ardèche) in southeast France, where in 1994 three cavers found deep chambers filled with paintings, engravings and drawings. Here cave drawings have been directly dated by radiocarbon as bison 30,340 BP; left-hand facing rhino 30,940 BP; right-hand facing rhino 30,790 BP and 32,410 BP with orders of error of 570-720 years. There has been some controversy on the datings at Chauvet cave ("Doutes des scientifiques sur la datation de la grotte Chauvet" - http://paleo.perso.cegetel.net/archeologic/bid.html). The controversy is about the possibilities of contamination etc., and is typical of problems to be dealt with. Excerpts are: Paul Bahn (Oxen newsletter) - "The final straw came when I
learned that some black dots in the Spanish cave of Candamo had been dated to more than 31,000 years ago by the lab which dated Chauvet; but samples from the same group of dots, dated by an American lab, produced two results of 15,000 (New scientist). So I have written an article with the palaeolithic archaeologist Paul
Pettit, a radiocarbon specialist, which is due to appear in the March issue of Antiquity ... What we urge - since it has not been done yet - is that multiple laboratories must be used in the direct dating of cave art ... and that the existing dates should be published with full data in specialised journals - the new series of dates for Chauvet, for example, have as yet only been published in the coffee-table book. These points appear to us to be basic science, but none of them has yet been implemented" and Hogan (New scientist 18/04/2003) "Jean Clottes, the archaeologist at the French Ministry of Culture who led the team exploring the cave, stands by his Chauvet results. But he has agreed to send Rowe a sample of charcoal from the cave floor, so that they can compare their results". This controversy is not saying the dates are necessarily incorrect, but they need to be checked. A separate method of dating cave art is based on the many animals depicted and assumption that in some cases where species are not shown they may have already
disappeared.
8,000 BC
The Ice Age ended, and the current geological period, the Holocene epoch,
began.
Agricultural civilisations began to emerged soon after this. The Holocene is
also sometimes
referred to as the Age of Man, for although Homo sapiens evolved long before the
start of the Holocene, all of recorded human history does falls within it.
[
Links - Various archaeological links above are mainly taken from or
found via the extensive resource pages of
Don Hitchcock, New England Girls' School, Armidale. Resources
for the study of Archaeology. A time line post 60ka BP is
given in a well illustrated Sydney archaeology book: Attenbrow, Val,
2002. Sydney's
Aboriginal past - Investigating the archaeological and historical
records. UNSW Press, Sydney. 225 pp. ~~~ "I would argue that this
book is a 'must read' for all people with an interest in Australian history
and/or cultural studies" (Reviewer Jeannie Herbert, James Cook
University) ]
STAYING IN TOUCH
These
pages do change, so check back sometime. LachlanHunter
would also like to hear from you if you are interested in any of the topics found on
these pages.
** DO YOU DIG INFORMATION? - THEN JOIN INFORMATION SHARING VIA THIS WEBSITE **
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get subscribed to LachlanHunter information sharing;
basically send what you are interested in knowing about, or interested in
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- LACHLANHUNTER MEMBERSHIP: LachlanHunter has levels of membership - One is
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just hear from us occasionally. Please contact us if you are interested in joining either category (associate or
other). Nowhere are there any costs involved with LachlanHuntrer. We hope to learn of others interested in the Lachlan, Hunter
and Sydney regions, or generally in geology, environment, earth history, general
history (esp. early settlement and mining, the gold rushes), archaeology, etc.
Once a member you will receive information, links to things in progress, news snippets, etc., and
also be encouraged to forward items which may interest others.
To join, please send an email with your name, occupation, contact email address and any other
comments to
john.mail@ozemail.com.au
WE ARE A SMALL GROUP:~
LachlanHunter Associates (geological, historical, geoarchaeological interests and
other services):
Julian
maintains a couple of websites and also runs a web-hosting business.
His main skills are in Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), HTML/DHTML/CSS,
and all things technological. He has
been using the Internet since 1995, and started making websites in 1999.
(Julian kindly hosts our ramblings here, provides free webspace to LachlanHunter, and offers
help on any computer matters - John)
is not a
geologist, but in fact spent many years putting up with or actually
cussing geologists and their ways (poor regard for paperwork and
management principles he was apt to say) when he was Administrative
Officer in the
Geological Survey at the same time some of the LH geo's worked there.
Peter has stayed associated in one way or another and has an interest in
the outdoors and in the business of employment. He left the Public
Service some years after the rest of us, to work in the employment
(agency) field.
Wombat
is not a geologist either, but he does dig mining
history. (Image
courtesy of Cutabolt Pty Ltd - bolts, mesh and mining accessories)
LAST MEETING
(in Homebush, NSW, a suburb of Sydney):
(Clockwise: Jane, Jag, John, Ann, Peter, Rochelle, Larry, Lawrie - at the Wok Inn, Homebush April 2006)
AND HERE'S ALSO NOTE OF SOME OTHER GEOLOGY/ARCHAEOLOGY AND
Recommended
geoarchaeology/petroarchaeology link - click below
Click
on the above image (what is petroarchaeology?) to go to the webpage shown, or
click
HERE
to go to the homepage of the author, Ellery Frahm. Ellery is a
research fellow at
Geology
and Geophysics, University of Minnesota Twin Cities campus, and also is doing
a
dissertation in archaeology on artefact sourcing in the Jezirah and Syro-Mesopotamia
area.
He is interested broadly in provenance studies and has worked with other
archaeologists
on sourcing slag, ceramics, bone, stone tools and more.
(Some various other geoscientists are mentioned below, from general interest - NB: These
people are not associated with LachlanHunter,
although
we might know some of them.)
Some
remarkable places
that vididly preserve memories:
Numerous
happenings within sedimentary environments have potential for the preservation
of traces or 'memories' that they happened.
LAETOLI
FOOTPRINTS
(Photo: John
Reader)
FOOTPRINTS
IN TIME and where we are now -
The area being brushed
clean in the above photo shows the tracks of what looks like an adult and child
walking side by side. From whence had they come and to where were they
heading one might wonder. They remind us of ourselves but these were not
humans for the rock dates at 3.5 million years old. Perhaps our ancestors,
yet of another species. This trackway of a presumed ancestor species was
discovered by a team lead by Mary Leakey in 1976, at Laetoli, Africa. The
tracks are so close they may have been holding hands? The bigger
individual walked on the right of the smaller one. Is there still and
tendency to walk on the right hand side of a child? The best guess
is that they were made by Australopithecus afarensis, which is the
species of 'Lucy' (viz. Lucy's
baby) .
Lucy was found not long before
these tracks were found, in 1974, by Donald Johanson. He named her from
the Beatles' song "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds". Not far from
the Lucy site he later found the remains from at least thirteen individuals,
possibly the victims of a flash flood. This was the first evidence of an
ancient hominid species living in groups - the clan.
Tiny step by tiny step we have been making evolutionary hominid strides for
over three million years ... surely "getting there" (but where?).
The line of
continuous life we are on has advanced much longer than that through time too. At first by
fin and tail our distant 'forebears' made their way forward in life, thence on all
fours, thence in upright mode, and into the formation of early society .... Only in the mere last two hundred years
has this life strand
become aware of its own origins and the seeming immensity of all. The
increase in knowledge is becoming more rapid, perhaps difficult to keep track
of.
MUNGO
FOOTPRINTS
Photo: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/21/AR2005122101828.html
Hundreds of human footprints dating back to the last Ice Age have been found at
Mungo.
Preserving
memories. What may the tracks of forebears tell us? Never give
up? A one-legged man had to cross a mud flat. Looks
like he made it. Says the elder Ms. Pappin of the Mutthi Mutthi, who
believes the footprints are of her people, the
prints are being revealed from under the sand dunes to "let the rest of the
world know how clever our people really were, living and surviving in their
environment".
(Scan of photo in an article by Deborah Smith,
Science Editor: "A step back in time" - December 22, 2005) -
Footsteps frozen in time of unknown
persons who perhaps could be direct ancestors of some still living in Australia,
being exposed by sweeping back the wind-blown sands that covered and preserved
them long ago.
HUNDREDS of human footprints
dating back to about 20 000 BC - the oldest known in Australia and the
largest collection of its kind in the world - occur in Mungo National Park in
western NSW where they were left by children, adolescents and adults as they
traversed a moist clay area near the Willandra Lakes.
The first footprint was found by
young Mary Pappin Jnr of the Mutthi Mutthi clan in August 2003 while exploring the
area with Professor Steve Webb of Bond University, as part of a project to
educate young Aboriginal people in archaeology. They found a clay pan area
up in the dunes near one of the lakes and there noticed the first of what's turned out
to be about 450 footprints over 700 square metres or so.
The
team has documented 22 track ways, some up to 20 metres long, from where single
persons had walked in a line. The tracks reveal that one very tall
person, presumably a man, was sprinting along at about 20 km/h. The footprints, some up to
15 millimetres deep, were laid down across silty clay that contained a
considerable amount of fine-grained calcium carbonate
that later hardened almost like concrete as it dried out. The dried prints were then
covered by a further crust of clay and finally by metres of sand from shifting
dunes. This sand had since began blowing away again, revealing the prints.
It is now more than three decades
since this part of far-western NSW provided proof that humans occupied Australia
at least 40,000 years ago. It was the former Australian National University
geomorphologist Jim Bowler who found the ancient bones of "Mungo Lady"
there in 1969 and "Mungo Man" in 1974, helping to unearth this history with eminent archaeologist and ANU
colleague Professor John Mulvaney. "When I walk across that landscape, through one's very feet you feel you're
walking on the history of land and people" .... "The vibrations
of history are palpable" .... said Jim Bowler when he revisited the area at the age of
76.
Popularising Geology:
DAVID JOHNSON is the author of "Geology of Australia" (Cambridge
University Press, 2004), which provides
a vivid and informative account of the evolution of the Australian continent
over the past 4400 million years. The famous geologist Edgeworth David
commenced the first academic attempt at a 'geology' of the whole of Australia
(which was completed postumously). Other general books on Australian
geology were written in the 1800s and early 1900s. There were later
popular classics written by Charles Laseron, The Face of Australia and
Ancient Australia, which were published in the 1950s. David Johnson's
book came as a timely new summary, much needed as there had been so many new
understandings of the continent developed over the last fifty years.
David's book is arranged in normal chronological manner, starting
with the Precambrian rocks which hold clues to the origins of life and the
development of an oxygenated atmosphere. It then covers the warm seas,
volcanism and multiple orogenies of the Palaeozoic which built the eastern third
of the continent. This illuminating history then details the breakup of Gondwana
and development of climates and landscapes in modern Australia, and finally the
period that David terms "The birth of Australia", after the break away
from Antartica took place 100 million years ago. After that came the
development of the continental shelves and coastlines that give the continent
the shape we recognise today as "Australia". As shown in
his chronology (near the top of this page) David also depicts segments of time
marked by volcanism, icehouse climate, greenhouse climate, and shallow sea
inundations of the continent. David
graduated BSc with First Class Honours from the University of Sydney in 1969 and
was awarded the Edgeworth David Prize for Palaeontology. He received his PhD
from the University of Western Australia in 1974 for a thesis entitled
‘Sedimentation in the Gascoyne River Delta, Western Australian’. He
afterwards travelled overseas and then worked as an exploration geologist in
Western Australia until 1978 when he was appointed a lecturer and eventually
Associate Professor in the School of Earth Sciences at James Cook University.
His major research interests include the sedimentology of cold climate coal
measures, the Permian Bowen Basin in Queensland, sedimentology of the Great
Barrier Reef, and the marine geology of Vanuatu. He currently holds the
position of Adjunct Senior Principal Research Fellow, School of Earth Sciences,
James Cook University. Reviewer
Danny Yee wrote of David's book "I've
been looking for an introduction to Australian geology for some time and I've
finally found just what I wanted. A geological history of Australia that's also
an introduction to geology ..... A lot is packed in and it's never the least bit
dull or dry." In April 2005 David gave a talk at the Australian
Science History Club (Australian Museum) on "Discovering
Australia's Glacial History."
DAVID ROOTS is a geophysicist and geologist in Sydney, Australia. He lectures
on geology and for over a decade he organised and lead geological field trips around the world
to places of special geological interest, taking geology to the travelling public. He has
co-authored many popular books and articles.
PAUL WILLIS is a palaeontologist who
who did a Ph.D. studying the evolution of crocodiles in Australia. He has co-lead dinosaur
tours and the like, and has been associated with many important fossil excavations. His enjoyment for communicating science to popular
audiences has involved him inter alia in touring elementary schools with a life-size
blow-up Tryanosaurus rex as his lecture companion. He is also a science reporter for
the ABC.
How does a
palaeontologist end up on television?
I had finished my PhD on
crocodiles, but found no one wants to employ you just because you know a lot
about dead crocodiles. I saw an advertisement in New Scientist for
traineeships in science broadcast journalism at the ABC and applied and got
in. Throughout my PhD, my supervisor drilled into me the importance of
communication. We need to be able to communicate science to the general
public because they pay for science through taxes and funding to
universities. After Jurassic Park came out, I ended up escorting an
inflatable Tyrannosaurus rex to presentations on dinosaurs at country
schools, so I developed a strong background in communication.
Is there much money to be made in
palaeontology?
No. The field is going through a
worldwide slump because it's seen as an old science. It's difficult to
get funding to do research because a lot of universities are closing down
geology and archaeology departments and museums aren't putting on new
palaeontologists. It's very difficult to put a dollar value on
understanding the past. We study palaeontology for the same reason
historians study history and sporting commentators go over statistics: the
best way of figuring out what will happen in the future is to understand
what happened in the past.
( From an interview with Anne
Fawcett, SMH Radar blog, March 30, 2005. Photo by Jules Boag. )
Paul Willis is co-author of "Digging Up Deep
Time: Fossils, Dinosaurs and Megabeasts from Australia's Distant Past"
(ABC Books, $34.95).
More Palaeontology:
ARTHUR BUSBY
is an Associate Professor of
Geology in Texas whose interests include fossil giant crocodiles, and computers (UNIX,
MacOS, OsX applications).
MARY WHITE is a palaeobotanist whose lifetime fascination with Gondwana and prehistoric
Australia has culminated in several award winning books (including the Greening of Gondwana)
and the creation of the Falls Forest Retreat - a Gondwana rainforest sanctuary to help
conserve biodiversity and inspire love of the natural world (themes in Mary's many popular writings
for which she was awarded a Doctor of Science degree by Macquarie University in 1999.
More about Mary.
Reviewer Danny Yee wrote of Mary's "After
the Greening: The Browning of Australia" (Kangaroo
Press, 1994): "After the Greening is a lavishly illustrated
botanical and geological history of Australia over the last two hundred
million years. It is a scientific synthesis which goes into considerable
detail (about specific plant taxa and geological formations) .... and will be
a pleasure for amateur geologists and botanists, conservationists, and many
others."
ALEXANDER (ALEX) RITCHIE -
List of publications is a renowned Australian palaeontologist specialising in ancient fish.
He has also been a pathblazer in the development of regional museums for natural history. Read
how the Canowindra Story
developed. A chance discovery was made in 1955 of an extensive fossil bed dating from the Devonian period.
The first portion of the fossil bed to surface was discovered when a road worker found a large
rock slab with strange impressions on it during the grading of an unsealed road between
Canowindra and Gooloogong. He pushed it aside to the fence line, where it was later spotted by a
local apiarist who recognised its importance and notified the Australian Museum. It was soon
recognised as one of the most remarkable discoveries of its kind anywhere in the world. Following major excavation
by Dr Alex Ritchie in July 1993, the realisation of the scale and importance of the fossil find prompted the construction of a fish fossil museum to
house and display the collection, now known as The Age of Fishes Museum. ("Imagine a world ruled by fish! Long before the dinosaurs the mighty rivers of the Central West teamed with bizarre ancient fishes - fish with armour shells, fish with lungs, and huge predators with jaws like crocodiles. Thousands of their fossils were found at Canowindra and give us a unique glimpse into life during the Devonian Period - the 'Age of Fishes'.
This 360 million year old formation contained the fossilised remains of over 3500 freshwater fish. Many were new to science. This unique fossil collection is now on public display in the township of Canowindra, only a short distance from the discovery location.
The Museum displays many of these beautiful fossils together with live aquarium displays and wonderful recreations of life in the Devonian."
Tectonics and structural geology:
ERWIN SCHEIBNER - (to be added).
Minerals and volcanoes:
LYN SUTHERLAND - (to be added).
AND WHERE WE ARE
Regarding where we are, or the principal geographical focus of interests for this website,
the history of the matter is that LachlanHunter Services was started (in 2005) by geologists in
NSW Australia who had in their past work been interested largely in the regions of New South
Wales known as the "Lachlan" region and "Hunter" region. Our experience is concentrated in
those regions; although certain of our members' skills (e.g. thin section interpretation, or
liaising or gathering information from government agencies) are also not highly dependent on
region at all. Although we are interested in geology and mineral resources worldwide, we are
particularly interested to hear from anybody interested in the Lachlan and Hunter regions. For
the future we might be also interested in associating with other sorts of services besides
geological ones. At present we offer or facilitate only geological services (except that our
latest affiliate Julian does also offer some totally general computer services).
Besides the Lachlan and Hunter regions some of us are also equally interested in the smaller
Sydney region. The Sydney region lies between the Lachlan and Hunter regions and is closely
allied to the latter. The group name might instead have been 'LachlanSydneyHunter' but that
would be getting too long, and in any case most geologists do associate the Hunter region with
the larger Sydney Basin named from Sydney. Although we do not all live in
Sydney (other locations include Orange and Wollongong), the
LachlanHunter Services P.O. Box address is in the Sydney suburbs (P.O. Box 121, Burwood NSW 1805)
and this website is coordinated from Sydney.
Click here on SYDNEY GEOLOGY for an overview of what the main geological structures are named around Sydney. Geological
information and overview for the Lachlan and Hunter regions will be added as this web site
expands.
Can
we perhaps do any work for you?
-
Please CONTACT US (contact individuals via links at right of
photos).
Interesting
as things like the origin or our species might be, one a more mundane level one
must also look for work, to keep the wolf from the door and to be
able to afford the recreational time to ponder more amazing thoughts. So
employ us if you can - we specialise in coal, rocks, geological history,
geological mapping, public relations and the mining industry, the topic of
global warming or climate change, increasing general geological awareness,
diamonds, gold, copper, limestone, fossils and archaeology. We take our
name "LachanHunter" from two of the best known great regions of New
South Wales. We mostly, but not all, live around Sydney which is the
capital city of New South Wales state.
Should you be interested in quotation of prices for any member services, then please directly contact the most relevant person as per contacts
found on the webpages for individuals. It is recommended that for any services relating
to computers/IT/hardware maintenance first contact
Julian. For document archiving (to CDs/DVDs), media restoration
services, or duplication services, first off contact
Jag (or for further details with pricing see Jag's
memories4ever site). If in doubt
contact John at john.mail@ozemail.com.au
LachlanHunter
associates are a loose cooperative of (at present) mainly geologists, but we
also welcome hearing from others who might like to join, such as archaeologists,
environmental educators, computer/IT people and others. There are no costs
at all involved in belonging.
For any
services, all payment arrangements should as a general rule be made directly
with the individual person providing the services. Only in the case of
government grants (e.g. we are interested in Geoheritage or other grants) is any central
managing of financial matters likely to be envisaged.
A
fuller guide to the interests and experience of associates will be put here once available. Group members
have had experienced as teachers/lecturers (both at schools and university
levels), in community relations work, fossils and biostratigraphy, in minerals
policy areas, in regional mapping, industrial and gem minerals (particular
interests include limestone, diamond, diatomite, silcrete), construction
materials (interests include sand resources and expanded aggregate), many
aspects of the world of coal mining and coal geology, exploration for
metalliferous resources (particular interests in gold and copper), GIS
use in resource mapping and assessment, land use planning and natural resource
management, geoheritage and mining history.
General
contact: If you have any difficulty contacting
individuals, or if you have general enquiries, then please use our general contact:
LachlanHunter Services & Associates,
P.O. Box 121, BURWOOD, NSW 1805, Australia (Email: john.mail@ozemail.com.au).
Otherwise
some suggested individual enquiry points (besides Julian and Jag mentioned
above) would be:
(Special fees
may apply for short call-out/mobilisation rapid assistance for maintaining exploration tenures
that
may be in danger of forfeiture or loss on account of
under-expenditure. However, all intitial advice is free.)
John Byrnes Details
Ann Byrnes 
Larry (Lawrence) Murray Barron
Lawrie (Lawrence) Sherwin 
Michael Hicks [
geology, photography - webpage 
Jag Singh 
Jennifer Wadsworth 
Tessa Corkill 
Anton Crouch 
(Photo: Michael Amendolia)
PAUL WILLIS is a palaeontologist who
who did a Ph.D. studying the evolution of crocodiles in Australia. He has co-lead dinosaur
tours and the like, and has been associated with many important fossil excavations. His enjoyment for communicating science to popular
audiences has involved him inter alia in touring elementary schools with a life-size
blow-up Tryanosaurus rex as his lecture companion. He is also a science reporter for
the ABC.
ALEXANDER (ALEX) RITCHIE -