Later on Saturday, October of 2017, the American Geode team made it to the famous outcrop called Red Hill that is near Renovo, Pennsylvania and close to North Bend, Pennsylvania. Red Hill is the site of a very famous tetrapod discovery, one of the earliest tetrapods discovered in North America. The outcrop is very steep, and very dangerous. American Geode classifies Red Hill as an “advanced” or “expert” fossil site. Red Hill is managed by a volunteer group nearby who host and house a fossil and geology museum that American Geode was very lucky to view during a private tour later that day. You can see where boulders have fallen out of the cliff, shards of rock crumbled on the road nearby, and while we were there, occasionally a pea sized pebble to a golf ball sized rock would drop from the cliff.
The fossils that one can find are Devonian plants, and if you are very lucky, one can find an insect, and if lightning strikes twice, once could find a tetrapod again. The American Geode team found many examples of Devonian Plants, but the rock is crumbly. When we brought the Devonian Plant fossils in matrix back to American Geode headquarters to clean up, we sprayed them with water sealant to help seal and protect the matrix.
We did not find any insects, but one of the rockhound paleontologists there described finding a scorpion one time!
If you have some time in the area, rockhounding or not, the museum nearby is a very educational and interesting experience. The museum information is here: https://www.facebook.com/RED-HILL-FIELD-STATION-AND-FOSSIL-DISPLAY-121627314538811/
*Call ahead to the museum! This is a volunteer staffed museum, so do not expect normal hours, and do not rely on information on their site. Call ahead!*
Here are photos of the Red Hill fossil trip and our Red Hill fossil discoveries! To see and purchase Red Hill fossils from the American Geode collection, go to our eBay store: https://www.ebay.com/usr/americangeode
