After a very exciting trip to Smithers Rock Talk we headed back home to Vancouver. From the highway we noticed The McAbee Fossil Beds Heritage Site and decided to take a quick look around. However, the site is currently closed under The Heritage Conservation Act. A quick snapshot of the fossil beds from the highway shows how geoscience can be discovered just off of roads, highways and beneath our feet!
The landscape here is steep, rugged and dry, with sparse vegetation and many exposed rock faces, hoodoos, scree slopes and gullies. This site has palaeontological value as it is one of the most diverse fossil sites in the province for insect populations such as ants, bees, and wasps as well as delicate flower and plant parts. These fossil beds are an irreplaceable record of the biological history of British Columbia dating to about 50 millions years ago. To learn more about these fossil beds click here.