Fossil Finds 



COLLECTING HISTORY 



Peter Harmatuk of Bridgeton 

 scooped up a handful of dirt, 

 sifted it through his fingers 

 and picked out a pointy gray 

 shark's tooth. "This is from a sand 

 shark. It's about 10 milhon years old," 

 he says, examining it with the casual 

 eye of an expert who'd seen others hke 

 it a thousand times. 



For nearly 28 years, Harmatuk has 

 been digging up history in North Caro- 

 lina, helping to piece together the puz- 

 zles of its past. His findings, and those 

 of other fossil hunters, provide impor- 

 tant clues to the weather conditions, 

 rock formations and animals that exist- 

 ed in the area over a 20 million-year 

 period that spanned four geologic for- 

 mations (Pungo River, Yorktown, 

 Croatan and Post Croatan). 



Harmatuk spends most of his time 

 sifting through the rubble at the Tex- 

 asgulf Chemicals Co. in Aurora. In this 

 canyon-sized pit in eastern North Caro- 

 lina, the petrified remains of hundreds 

 of species of fish, shellfish, plants and 

 animals lay scattered across the dirt 

 like toys in a game room. 



The mine, in a way, is a collector's 

 playground. Harmatuk says 85 million 

 sharks' teeth are dug out of the dirt in a 

 24-hour period. And since the mine 

 opened in the early 1960s, 70 different 

 kinds of fish, 24 kinds of porpoises and 

 24 species of birds have been uncov- 

 ered. 



"We keep finding new stuff all the 

 time," says Harmatuk. Just recently, 

 collectors found new whale and por- 

 poise species. 



Of the 2,300 feet of sedimentary lay- 

 ers in Aurora, only the first 100 feet are 

 exposed in the pit. Most of the fossils 

 uncovered are from the Pungo River 



Photo by Sarah Friday 



Peter Harmatuk 



formation and later, says Rusty 

 Walker, former manager of pubhc 

 affairs for the N.C. Phosphate Corpo- 

 ration in Aurora. 



In the Pungo River formation, most 

 evidence reveals bottom dwellers like 

 worms, clams, brachiopods and 

 shrimp-like animals, says Walker. 



What collectors have found are 

 many prototypes of animals we know 

 today. Fossils of primitive whales and 

 dolphins with their neck vertebrae not 

 fused are typical of the Pungo River 

 formation. 



In terms of variety, the Yorktown 

 layer is the richest, says Harmatuk. 

 When the ocean covered eastern North 

 Carolina 5 million years ago, condi- 

 tions were hearty for all kinds of life. 

 As a consequence, many of the fossils 

 found in the 50-foot Yorktown layer 

 represent land and water animals that 

 still exist. Very few plants survived 

 because they were so fragile. 



"I found a giant tortoise (fossil) a 

 few months ago," says Harmatuk. "It 

 weighed about 700 pounds." He's also 

 discovered remnants of sharks, 

 whales, porpoises, fish, walruses, ele- 

 phants, horses, camels and birds — rare 

 birds, he says, awks mostly and some 

 buzzards. "I found a bird that was 

 essentially complete, and it had its last 

 meal in its stomach — fish bones." 



After all these years, Harmatuk still 

 frequently finds a surprise buried be- 

 neath the soils. He's dusted off the fos- 

 silized remains of tapirs (hoglike mam- 

 mals), manatees and crocodiles. And 

 even the Smithsonian Institution 

 doesn't believe he found pieces of vol- 

 canic rock. "They say it shouldn't be 

 here, but it is," he says. One possible 

 explanation is that it floated across the 

 Atlantic Ocean. 



Many of Harmatuk's treasures are 

 on display at the Aurora Fossil Muse- 

 um, which opened in 1978. The muse- 

 um shares the secrets of fossils once 

 locked in the earth's crust. When re- 

 vealed, their messages are clear. 



"They let us know how the earth was 

 formed," says Walker. "If we look at 

 fossils, we can see what conditions 

 were here. And the same geologic for- 

 ces are at work today." 



— Sarah Friday 



