My visit to the Regatta Facility

The UCMP houses one of the largest fossil collections associated with a university in the world, so it is no wonder that some of the fossils need to be stored off-campus at the UC Regatta facility, located nearby in Richmond. This large warehouse is home to multiple campus-wide museum collections, including a variety of enormous whale skulls, huge ichthyosaur skeletons, and cyclopean bones of mammoths and dinosaurs from the Museum of Paleontology.

The Regatta facility is also the current location of the fossils that have been recovered from the 4^th bore Caldecott Tunnel project, and so I recently paid a visit. From the somewhat daunting pile of boxes, I selected several big, heavy ones labeled “vertebrates” and “invertebrates,” as well as some lighter, flat containers labeled “plants,” to take back to the UCMP in Berkeley. And the next day, I went to work.

Left: a newly-opened box of fossils from the Caldecott Tunel 4th bore; Right: my workspace in the UCMP fossil preparation lab

Removing the lid of the first box revealed a pile of small bundles enveloped in toilet paper and neatly packed away in labeled plastic bags. After unwrapping a few of these small packages, I began to get an idea of the variety of fossils and rock samples that come from the Caldecott tunnel. Most of the fossils I’ve seen so far are small, ranging in size from a tiny tooth several millimeters long, to some about as large as a fist. Many are broken or incomplete. But though they may not be visually impressive, they are rich in history. Not only will these fossils elucidate what the environment and climate of the East Bay was like in the middle Miocene Epoch, 9-16 million years ago, but they also provide clues about what happened to these organisms after they died. It is interesting, for example, that most of the invertebrate fossils are natural molds or ‘impressions’ in pieces of rock, while the vertebrates are preserved mainly as pieces of bones and teeth. Did they live in different habitats? Did they die in different places? How were these fossils preserved? These questions remain to be answered, and we’ll have to wait until further evidence comes in as I unpack and examine more material!

The plant fossils, however, are another story. Their preservation is quite good, and there are many leaves that can be seen very clearly, complete with anatomical details, on small slabs of rock. They are also especially interesting because they are particularly good indicators of the ancient climate of the San Francisco Bay Area, and provide a comparison of current and past geographic ranges of particular species. We will turn to this subject soon when I interview UCMP paleobotanist Diane Erwin…

UCMP paleontologist Mark Goodwin examines a foot bone of an ancient camel

A drawer full of unpacked Caldecott Tunnel fossils

About once a month, I drive from Berkeley to Walnut Creek to pick up specimens for my thesis (dead birds for a study of the evolution of development in Aves), which necessitates a pass through the Caldecott Tunnel. Each time, I heave a sigh and try to shore up my patience as traffic before the tunnels slows to a stop. However, this bane has recently metamorphosed into an object of great interest, for it has come to my attention that the construction here is also uncovering of one of Earth’s most alluring treasures: fossils!

The construction workers are burrowing through rocks that are 9 to 16 million years old. Here, the hills have yielded thousands of fossils of all types of organisms, from plants, to vertebrates and invertebrates, to microfossils (very tiny plants and animals). They, in turn, provide clues to the past flora, fauna, and paleoenvironment of the Bay Area. Who knew that such a wealth of fossils could be found so nearby?

This semester, I am fortunate enough to be a Graduate Student Researcher (GSR) in the UC Museum of Paleontology (UCMP), a position funded by the California State Department of Transportation (known locally as Caltrans) as a component of a new partnership with the UCMP. The plan, in short, is for Caltrans to deposit the fossils recovered from the 4th bore Caldecott Tunnel construction project in UCMP, and for UCMP to clean, catalogue, and curate them. For further details on the UCMP/Caltrans project, please see Mark Goodwin’s article. As the GSR for this project, it will be my job to prepare the fossils by cleaning the dirt off, gluing together what is broken, and properly curating them in the museum.

Scanning the Prep Lab from left to right. Click on the image to see an enlargement.

When I was a little girl with aspirations to become a scientist and study fossils, I was a volunteer paleontologist at Anza-Borrego Desert State Park in southeastern California. It was here that I first discovered the appeal of fossil preparation, and the wonderful feeling of reward that comes after many hours of meticulous work. Thus, I am quite excited about the work that I will do over the next few months!

I’ve just completed a scrub-down and organization of the UCMP fossil preparation lab in anticipation of this work, and the boxes of fossils will be arriving soon! As I proceed, I will report on the exciting finds that come to light as each box is opened, and the tale these fossils recount about the paleontology and geology of the East Bay hills.