Re: Photo quiz: what is this?

superdanigirl@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
On May 25, 11:16 pm, coastwatch <coastwa...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 24 May, 13:43, superdanig...@xxxxxxxxx wrote:





Hello,
I think I'm probably in the correct group but if not please don't
shoot me but refer me to the right place, ok? A relative I never heard
of died recently. I think he was a geologist. My parents found some
digital images that must have something to do with his work, These
photos really fascinate me and I would like to know what's on them.
Some of these thingies look like shells or snails, there are many
small rounded bubbles, maybe plant parts, others I don't even have an
idea what they might be.
Please can you tell me what I'm looking at? I uploaded them here:http://s182.photobucket.com/albums/x271/thingyphotos/
Thanks a lot,
Dani :)
Hi Dani, thanks for the interesting photos.

I agree with another poster, they look like photomicrographs - Thin
sections of what is probably a limestone, some of the shots such as
Image 8 which shows a good cross section of a Foraminifera ( Foram)
Image 9 Cfhttp://www.fortunecity.com/greenfield/ecolodge/60/foram3.jpg
- more forams Image 2 - another type of Foram Cfhttp://www.fortunecity.com/greenfield/ecolodge/60/foram6.jpg
See Mike Horne's microfossil pagehttp://www.hull.ac.uk/php/chsmjh/microhome.html

I am happy to take correction on image 15 - it might be yet another
Foram, but it might be a Bryozoan

Cheers
Nigel Whittington
Hull
East Yorkshire - The Ice age coast
UK- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Thanks a lot for all your kind answers. I didn't know you can actually
look through rocks with a microscope, maybe that's why I could not
even imagine what was on the images. But anyway, these foraminifera
are really beautiful, and so different. Can I ask you guys why someone
would take photographs of them? I mean, apart from being beautiful you
can probably do something with them, don't you? And do you know what's
there to see on image 3? There is a dark blob to the left, then
something with many tiny chambers that looks like the skin of a garden
slug (that is not one of these forams?) and then something green.

Thank you all,
Dani :)


Some people study forams. By examining the types of forams you can tell what sort of environment in which the rock formed, and make an educated guess at local climate at the time.

The 'something with many tiny chambers' looks like a piece of a byzoan fan to me.

Remember, you are looking at a churned up area--you're not seeing complete fossils (except for the small ones). For example: there are things which look like a sliced through gastropod, and the pygium of trilobites, too. I suspect the green is an artifact of the photos being taken by polarized light. microphotographs taken under polarization is a common technique; it does introduce red and green false colors sometimes.
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