Question: How do you find these 350 million year old fossils ?

Duncan Murdock answered on 15 Mar 2010:

Great question! We dig out some pieces of rock that we know are the right age and type and break them into lumps about fist-sized. Then put them into a weak acid, it’s basically vinegar. Because the rock is made of limestone (the same stuff as chalk) it dissolves away, but the fossils are made of apatite (the same stuff as your teeth and bones) and they are left behind. Once I’ve washed what’s left through a sieve I look at it down a microscope and pick up the tiny fossils with a fine damp paintbrush and put them into little card slides. It sounds a lot of work, but it’s worth it!