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DISPATCH 04:
Things to Come
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KOOBI FORA, Kenya
While the excavation is in progress at Ileret, the second half
of the field team has been
looking for fossils,
based out of the research camp at Koobi Fora. Each day we drive
out to the fossil exposures and walk slowly over the fossil
exposures to the north of the Koobi Fora Ridge. This year we are
armed with
hand held field computers into which the data is
entered in the field and downloaded through a docking station
back in the camp in the evenings. These hand held computers
greatly facilitate data collection and have reduced the time
spent on the laptops in the afternoons updating records. As
usual each
fossil found by the team in the field is recorded,
photographed and given a GPS point. This allows the fossil to be
relocated. All the field data is compiled into a main database
on a daily basis.
Patrick Gathogo is conducting detailed geological studies of the
lake basin as part of his PhD thesis. His work is extremely
significant in our understanding of depositional environments in
which fossils were preserved as well as the provenance or age of
the fossil sites in which we work. His efforts will be an
enormous contribution to the 40 years of research conducted here
so far.
This season over 240
specimens
have been found so far and include primates, pigs, antelopes,
elephants and horses.
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