Our first meeting of the year was the AGM for which 21 people attended. The AGM was followed by one of Dr Sara Metcalf's super talks. This time on the “Grinshill Fossil”.
On a club field trip to Grinshill quarry in 2013 the owners donated, to Powysland Museum Welshpool, a slab of Tarporley Siltstone containing a series of 19 fossilised footprints and rain drop pits. The talk given by Sara elucidated the current thinking on what formed the prints. Fossils of the herbivorous reptile Rhyncosaurus have previously been found at Grinshill and footprints found have been attributed to that reptile. She went on to say that the slab of Tarporley siltstone was Lower Anisian ( Middle Triassic) in age and would have been laid down in low energy rivers in an arid landscape. Recent re-evaluation of the so-called Rhyncosauroides footprints of Owen and others by Geoff Tresise of Liverpool Museum has shown them to be not related to the actual Rhyncosaur beast that has been found at Grinshill, but probably from a small archosaur reptile called a Protorosaur.
More photos of Sara's talk and the fossil footprints can be found on the Powysland Museum Facebook page.
The next meeting will be held on Wednesday 19th of February when Dr Geoff Steele will give a talk entitled “The Origins of Life”.