Newsletter 33

July 2017 GEOSUFFOLK TIMES Welcome to issue no.33 of GeoSuffolk Times – for GeoSuffolk is on Facebook and Twitter – find us at: those who value ’s Geodiversity. Caroline https://www.facebook.com/GeoSuffolk Markham 20.07.17 www.geosuffolk.co.uk https://twitter.com/geosuffolk

Transport Rocks Three Interglacials I enjoy visiting transport museums, not least because Hoxnian: GeoSuffolk’s visit to the interglacial site at

of finding geological specimens. I have already Barnham (on private ground) on July 2nd proved to be mentioned (GeoSuffolk Times 24) the block of Aswan most interesting, thanks to Nick Ashton (British (Egypt) granite in Ipswich Transport Museum. On its Museum), Rob Davis and Peter Hoare (Queen Mary home ground it was a popular stone with Kings University of London) and Simon Parfitt (Natural Djedefre, Khafre and Menkaure who used it for casing History Museum). Barnham is fast becoming the most on the outside of their pyramids. Returning to Suffolk, fossiliferous Hoxnian site in the country, with visit the East Anglian Transport Museum at Carlton brickearth from a lake deposit yielding plant material, Colville to see ‘granite’ kerbstones in ‘Herting Street’. non-marine molluscs, fish, amphibians, freshwater They came from the former Silvertown flyover in East turtles, bats, elephants, voles, bison and deer. In London and were a showpiece in wearing qualities for another exposure a bed of fluviatile flint cobbles has the granite industry. They include specimens from Clactonian and Acheulian age flint implements. We Aberdeen, Cornwall, Guernsey, Leicester, Mysore and look forward to further publication of the material Norway, as named on cast iron blocks. Their surfaces from this exciting site. For more information see are not easy to study after their ‘showpiece’ history. A http://www.geog.qmul.ac.uk/research/breckland/ CM visitor to the Museum of the Great Western Railway Ipswichian: On June 11th the Suffolk Wildlife Trust (‘Steam’) at Swindon will see Isambard Kingdom invited GeoSuffolk to join in with their ‘bioblitz’ in the Brunel’s geological collection, including for example a Kiln Meadow part of Belstead Brook Park in Ipswich. specimen of Blue Lias as used in Bridgend Station. The type site of the Ipswichian interglacial is at the Bob Markham (RM) Bobbitshole sewage works just to the east of Kiln Meadow and GeoSuffolk has an information panel in Fossils for Primary Schools the car park there, so we decided it would be On June 30th GeoSuffolk exhibited fossils at a STEM interesting to ‘geoblitz’ the fossil plants in Richard (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) West’s Ipswichian list (published in The Transactions Fayre at Hartismere High School in Eye. We enjoyed of the Royal Society May 1957) and see how many are talking to pupils from the six north Suffolk living there today. Of the 105 plants identified by primary schools which attended. The Smilodon skull Professor West, we found 39, i.e. 37% - not bad for a and Tyrannosaurus tooth replicas were great day’s work! CM favourites on our stand. The children were also very Flandrian: On May 11th RM took the Ipswich Society interested in the Palaeozoic specimens - unfamiliar to for a walk from Barrack Corner to Bobby Robson Suffolk eyes, and our microscopic foraminifera. CM Bridge along the Devensian terraces and Flandrian floodplain on which the foundations of the lower part Geo-events of Ipswich rest. He talked about fossils, flint Treasures from the Earth – GeoSuffolk is joining this implements, earthquakes and building stones*. For ‘show and tell’ event at Brandon Country Park on July more see 26th. http://www.brandoncountrypark.org.uk/events/treasures- http://www.ipswichsociety.org.uk/newsletter/newsle from-the-earth/ Fair – visit GeoSuffolk’s stand at this event tter-july-2017-issue-208/ CM run by the SWT on Knettishall Heath on August 13th. *If you enjoy urban geology RM and other GeoSuffolk http://www.suffolkwildlifetrust.org/events/2017/08/13/knettishal members will be on duty at Blackfriars in Ipswich on l-fair?instance=0 Heritage Open Days – September 10th.

Dr Peter Long Peter, for many years a Mycologist at the University of Snippets Leicester, died 14th March 2017 aged 79. Hailing  September 19th, Ipswich Museum – join from a Lowestoft family, his father, R A Long was a Conservator Bob Entwistle and Museum Assistant founder member of the Lowestoft Field Club. Twins, Will Hepps as they tackle the annual cleaning of Peter and David were introduced to the crag at Ipswich Museum resident mammoth, Wool-I-Am. Covehithe in the 1950s and became keen geologists. https://cimuseums.org.uk/event/museum- They found many shells elsewhere rare in the Crag, as recorded by Peter in the 1958 Lowestoft Field secrets-cleaning-wool-i-am/ Club publication vol.2 part 3 (see also Ipswich  Left-handed garden snail news (see GeoSuffolk Geological Group Bulletin 10 August 1971 Times 31) – the Ipswich snail and another from http://www.geosuffolk.co.uk/images/ipswich- Majorca produced 170 offspring, all right-handed. geological-group/iggbulletin10.pdf)Peter’s enthusiasm The ‘original’ left-handed snail from London for and knowledge of the Crag was further recognised remains lonely (from Ipswich Star 19.05.17). by editor Dr Roger Dixon for articles in the Geological  As we look forward to having a GeoSuffolk stand Society of Norfolk’s 50th Anniversary Jubilee Volume, at the OASI 50th Anniversary event, I enjoyed Paul 2000 (on Scrobicularia Crag) and GeoSuffolk’s Whiting’s article on 19th Century Aurora Celebration of Suffolk Geology, 2012 (on Coralline Observations in Suffolk in their recent newsletter Crag). RM (July 2017). Paul tells us that one ‘mechanic’ Visit Museums this Summer measured the acceleration due to gravity on Earth Meet GeoSuffolk and learn more about your own 10 geological finds at these ‘show and tell’ events: as 7.1 x 10 furlongs per fortnight squared! RM Colchester Natural History Museum August 2nd, 10-12 and 2-4 https://cimuseums.org.uk/event/fantastic- Geo-Anglia fossils/  August 14th - see the West Runton Mammoth with Ipswich Museum August 9th 10.30am – 3pm Dr David Waterhouse at Gressenhall Museum, https://cimuseums.org.uk/event/show-and-tell-3/ Norfolk.https://www.arttickets.org.uk/gressenhall Also at Ipswich Museum, Real Granites – a chance to -farm-workhouse/mammoth-tour see specimens from the reserve collection. August  The University of East Anglia demonstrated work 16th, 11am – 3pm. on bio-batteries in the Innovation Hub at the

Royal Norfolk Show 2017. The bacteria Amoeboceras Shewanella oneidensis can use iron oxide for ammonite fossil (an respiration, producing electricity as a side product erratic from Flixton, Suffolk) –identified at (electrons transferred during reduction – change the last Colchester of state – from ferric to ferrous iron), which can Museum event. Photo: be used to charge batteries. A thought: can we Wayne Dutnall use the Red Crag as a gigantic power station?! RM

Have you visited Mildenhall Museum? A recent visit Suffolk Underwater Studies revealed some excellent local geology in the displays. Stuart Bacon’s Orford craft shop, and with it his Highlights include – ichthyosaur and plesiosaur Suffolk Underwater Studies Exhibition, has closed on vertebrae from ; some Palaeolithic his retirement. Born in Aldeburgh, Stuart was taken to ‘scrapers’ from High Lodge; the Sydney Ford collection Dunwich as a boy by his parents c. 1947 when they sat of flint technology ranging from early Palaeolithic on the ruins of All Saints Church (which fell over the implements to 19th century gunflints. Upstairs there cliff earlier that century) on the beach for a picnic. is bog oak, and a useful display of local building Years later Stuart qualified as a diver and found materials, including bricks from Elveden, remains of the church underwater in 1971. Further and Burwell brickyards. CM work followed, not helped by sediment in suspension http://mildenhallmuseum.co.uk/ limiting visibility. The Suffolk Shoreline and the Sea by Jean and Stuart Bacon, published by Segment, Visit GeoSuffolk’s stand, Planet Earth at the Colchester in 1984, gives a good flavour of our coast. Orwell Astronomical Society 50th Anniversary RM Convention on July 29th at the University of Suffolk Waterfront Building in Ipswich. http://www.oasi.org.uk/index.php