Trace Fossil Stone Becomes Fourth Entry in TumbleStoneTwo’s Hall of Fame

Beach stones.

Hall of Fame Entry 1: Fossil coral.

Hall of Fame Entry 2: Mossy jasper.

Hall of Fame Entry 3: Hematite jasper.

TumbleStoneTwo’s Hall of Fame contains stones personally collected and/or tumble polished that I particularly value for some reason. The first three inductees were an agatised fossil coral from Gemstone Beach, a mossy jasper from Kakanui’s Seadown Beach, and a hematite jasper from a South Timaru beach (photos above).

One of the types of stones that caught my attention from early on in my fossicking career and prompted quite a bit of research on my part is what locals call a “fossilised worm cast” stone and what I now usually call a “trace fossil” stone. These are the fossilised burrows or tracks of some animal left in ocean floor sediments in the Permian Era (250 to 300 million years ago). I have found many such stones along the south coast of the South Island, but am aware of them being found elsewhere as well, including the North Island. Note that there are a range of different kinds of trace fossil stones with burrows and tracks in them in New Zealand, including those found along the Kaikoura Coast often referred to as “zoophycos”.

TumbleStone Blog contains a Series of four Posts on these trace fossil stones, the start of this Series being a Post from July 2019. “The Tattooed Rock, The Trace Fossils…” is a March 2023 Post that effectively provides a brief summary of the Series, along with some additional information. In mid-2020, I compiled a small photo-book “The Trace Fossil Stones of Gemstone Beach”, and the stones often feature in my Calendars (such as the 2020 TumbleStone Calendar) and have appeared in other Posts, such as an alphabetical Series (see here).

TumbleStone Calendar 2020. Hall of Fame #4 is lower left stone.

TumbleStone photo book, 2020.

https://tumblestoneblog.wordpress.com/2019/07/22/the-fossilised-worm-cast-stones-of-gemstone-beach-and-riverton-part-two-what-is-a-trace-fossil/

https://tumblestoneblog.wordpress.com/2021/11/22/u-is-for-unusual-variations-of-trace-fossil-stones-and-v-is-for-the-chevron-shape-of-trace-fossils/

The fourth entry into TumbleStoneTwo’s Hall of Fame is a reasonably small flat trace fossil stone found on Gemstone Beach. It is about 3.5 cm tall and wide, and between 4mm and 6 mm thick. The trace shape on it consists of a number of chevrons in a sinuous J. To my mind, it is an excellent representative of its kind.

Tumble-polished trace fossil stone, Gemstone Beach.

The full entry in the Hall of Fame can be found here.

Author: tumblestoneblog

Retired Academic, male, living in the New Zealand countryside near Whanganui with his wife as well as Jasper the dog, Fluffy the cat, Dancer and Penny, the horses, and a shed half-full of stones. Email john.tumblestone@gmail.com. View all posts by tumblestoneblog