Pixeldawg Loc: Suzhou, China

Very early in my career, I worked for a small daily paper in Winter Haven, Florida called the "Winter Haven News Chief". Not a very good newspaper, but I was doing what I loved and didn't really care. And as a reporter, I met many people who were responsible for promoting a cause, brand or company in my daily work. One of them was a woman, whose name I forget now, but she represented the Phosphate industry and was telling me about how the mining operations were done. I was intrigued, because I wanted to be more educated about strip mining and the environmental ramifications of doing this. I also found out that 90% of the world's phosphate comes from Central Florida and that it is a byproduct of the decomposition of dinosaurs. 60 Million years ago, this portion of Florida was under water and a vast amount of phosphate was deposited there. Right conditions at the right time. So, in these mining operations they have paleontologists who examine anything unusual found in the mines. At that time, they would also allow fossil hunters to go into the mine area to search for fossils as well, and a paleontologist would examine whatever they found and if it was the common fair, would allow them to keep it. I was invited to go along on one of these hunts and made the photo that you see here. The machine in the background is called a "Drag Line" and it is electrical. The machine can scoop up enough dirt in one swath to fill a rail car. At these sites though, they would fill huge dump trucks, which off-loaded onto a conveyor belt, which emptied into a submerged water line that transported the material to a processing plant.


I also learned that, despite my distaste for strip mining, phosphate is in just about everything we touch from Orange Juice to tooth paste to the car we drive. It is everywhere. Our life as we know it, would not exist without it. So, I have made my peace with it.


So, back to the fossil hunt. I was walking around and watching the goings-on of the hunters and stumbled on a rock in the ground. I looked down and it had a very sharp, pointed line, so took out my pocket knife and dug up a gigantic tooth- a full 7 inches long and looked like the shark teeth I'd seen on the beaches. I took it over to the paleontologist and his eyes grew very large. He asked where I found it and I pointed to the spot that was only a few yards away from where we were standing. He said "This is a megalodon tooth. For every inch of tooth, the shark was ten feet long.". I was amazed. "I've never, ever seen one this big before" he continued, and handed it back to me. I questioned him a bit more and found out that a tooth this size for this species was 1 in a million kind of rare. He likened it to winning the lottery. Because of the ethics involved, I couldn't keep the tooth anyway because it would be considered a gratuity, so I handed it back to him and said "Find it a good home". He lit up and told me about a small museum that their staff had in Mulberry, Florida and that he would put it on display there. Problem solved. Now, it would be available for many to enjoy and be amazed to see a tooth that came from a shark that was 70 feet long.


This photo shows the drag line and adults standing in front of it. I shot this with a Pentax LX and Tri-X film and shot with a Tamron 180mm F2.5 edif lens. The photo not only was the lead shot in the paper, but also moved on the AP wire service- one of the first images I'd gotten onto the wire service. Hope you enjoy!

TBerwick Loc: Houston, Texas

Very interesting back-story.

dat2ra Loc: Sacramento

Great story except some of the details are a bit off. The phosphoric deposits are Pleistocene in age, 65 million years after the dinosaurs went extinct, so have nothing to do with them. Also, the deposits are marine, and dinys were terrestrial. The megalon was a giant shark, truly fearsome, but not a dinosaur. But thanks for the story. I'm sure fossil hunting is off limits now what with all the legal b.s.
Roland
Emeritus Professor of Geology
UC Davis

Pixeldawg Loc: Suzhou, China

Well, I suppose that's why I am a professor of digital media and not Paleontology. :-) Thank you for the correction(s).

Blaster34 Loc: Florida Treasure Coast

Nice story Pixeldawg and thanks for the great picture. Growing up in Kissimmee in the 50's-60's we traveled a lot in that neck of the woods so to speak. Mulberry was in our football conference and we would always beat up on them pretty bad but loved to go down there and look/watch the "Bigger Diggers" as they were called, huge draglines, scoop p the earth. BTW, fossils are still accessible along the Peace River in southern FL and a lot of the large shark's teeth are still found.

Largobob

Many years ago, I was an instructor at a science center west of Tampa. One of our "day trips" was a trip over to the phosphate mines to look for fossils. We secured permission in advance, and were met at the entrance by a guide. A highlight was having our group picture taken inside the bucket of the drag line. We had to hurry. To stop for the picture cost the company $10K in lost revenue. Their drag line was digging 3 buckets per minute, at $10K per bucket.

Over the years, we found some amazing artifacts. Some years later, we would visit the same phosphate areas to witness their massive and remarkable reclamation efforts. I will say that they did a truly outstanding job putting their site back to better than original condition. There are now clear lakes/ponds with planted grasses that are the home for all type of wildlife. At least here in Central Florida, the phosphate industry has been good stewards of the environment.

Blaster34 Loc: Florida Treasure Coast

Absolutey....

jaymatt Loc: Alexandria, Indiana

Nice photo of the machine and an interesting story.

Don W-37 Loc: Bangkok, Thailand

Mark,
Very nice photo - I'll bet you have a lot more of them. And a good story, too. (Also, appreciate the technical adjustments from Roland.)

If you have published any books, are they available on Amazon?
Cheers,
Don

dat2ra Loc: Sacramento

Largo: It would be good to see pix of the reclamation. I've been in mining for decades and always appreciate when industry does right by the environment. Fossils there are world famous, btw, not only for their diversity, but for their extraordinary preservation and beauty.

Pixeldawg Loc: Suzhou, China

Really? I didn't know this! Sure am learning a lot from posting this! Thanks one and all!

Pixeldawg Loc: Suzhou, China

Hi Don,

Nope, not yet but I am actually working on two books right now. One is a book about Jiangsu (Gee-ang-sue) Province, where I live and work and the other is a fiction book. I do intend to self publish them and put the e-versions on Amazon. My school may also be interested in publishing a hard copy of the Jiangsu Province book as well. Will be a while before either of these happens, but I will make a note to let you know when they do. Thanks for asking!

Don W-37 Loc: Bangkok, Thailand

Mark,
I'll buy a copy for sure - paper or Kindle.
Cheers,
Don