Fossils

William Lindsay's advice (in Conservation DistList Instance: 9:73)
on conservation of the ammonite in limestone is good but perhaps
does not go far enough. There is information available on in situ
conservation, and there are available geological conservators with
formal training. I am the only person in the United States with a
post-graduate diploma in geological conservation, and there are
several people in Canada (Gerald Fitzgerald and Robert Waller at the
Canadian Museum of Nature come to mind) who are qualified as
geological conservators.

I recently concluded co-teaching professional short courses in
preventive and advanced geological conservation. These courses will
be offered again in 1997 in the US, and 2 more will be added:
identification of geological materials, and conservation of
geological materials in situ. These are being offered to augment the
stone conservation literature (a surprising amount of which does
very little to identify geological materials) and to answer the
ever-demanding issues in geological site conservation.

I do not have the original posting by Cor Knops, but I would urge
Mr. Lindsay and others to consider the UV-degradation
characteristics of any polymeric material recommended for in situ
conservation. I have seen several in situ applications which were
very detrimental to the specimen or site as they rapidly degraded.

Sally Shelton
Director, Collections Care and Conservation
San Diego Natural History Museum
P.O. Box 1390
San Diego, California  92112
619-232-3821
Fax: 619-232-0248

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                  Conservation DistList Instance 9:79
                   Distributed: Tuesday, May 28, 1996
                        Message Id: cdl-9-79-003
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