Most people, when they hear the word fossil, imagine dinosaurs – large, fearsome, creatures. Or perhaps they think of more recently extinct animals, like saber-toothed cats or wooly mammoths. If they have experience of collecting, they might be familiar with the more commonly encountered fossils: clamshells, shark’s teeth, or the coiled shells of ammonites (extinct […]

Using a polarizing filter to enhance imaging of fossil insect compressions from the Florissant shale. By Ricardo Pérez-de la Fuente

In July and August of this year, Fossil Insect Collaborative scientists Sam Heads and Jared Thomas of the Illinois Natural History Survey led an expedition to the Ruby Valley in southwest Montana to collect fossil insects and plants from the paper shales of the Renova Formation.

If you’ve been following the Fossil Insect Collaborative through social media or as a participant in the digitization project, chances are you’ve seen examples of the specimens being imaged at the University of Colorado Museum of Natural History (UCM). ...