THEME: Limestone Gorge
SUBJECT AREA: Geography
TOPIC: Stromatolites
On our past weekend, we got to have two full layover days, or rest days at Limestone Gorge. Its rock walls, swimming hole, and beautiful hikes were taken in fully by myself, and the rest of the group.
On the hikes you could learn about everything the park had to offer from flora and fauna, to the unique rock formations and structures surrounding you. A really neat thing I learned about were the fossils called stromatolites. They are considered to be the oldest known evidence of life on earth!
They are formed in shallow seas or lagoons when millions of cyanobacteria (primitive bacterial life forms) colonise together in a cabbage shaped growth. Filaments, poking out from the bacteria trap sediment and eventually become fossilized, thus creating stromolites.
At Limestone Gorge there are a lot of stromatolites at the Skull Creek formation. They are way cool to see and understand what you are really looking at!
They can be found under the earth about 20 metres and are sometimes exposed by the elements like here at Limestone Gorge, so we can see them!
Suggested learning activities: Investigate unusual rock formations and types of rocks in your area. How were they formed and from what type of geographical feature? Was your area once an ocean or a shallow sea? What fossil evidence might indicate this?
Crister