Life on the Rocks in Point Riche

Marine gastropod fossil

One of my favourite moments during a visit to western Newfoundland is the "life on the rocks" exploration of Point Riche. The headland lies near the town of Port-au-Choix, on the island's Great Northern Peninsula, and its white octagonal lighthouse with a bright red lantern room is a striking sight. Below the lighthouse, though, is where this spot's treasures are found. In the broad limestone beds on the shore, thousands of marine fossils, mostly cephalopods and gastropods can be seen.  It takes only a moment for the eye to become accustomed to the search; when it has, a scan of the rocks reveals one tight spiral after another, sometimes dozens within a space the size of a small notebook.

Fossils at Point Riche

Among the fossils are tidal pools that evaporate quickly in the summer sun, leaving a rim of salt around their edges. In the cracks of the rock, tiny plants take root in the most challenging of circumstances. Minke whales, seals and dolphins can occasionally be seen passing by, and when there are small fish like capelin or juvenile herring in the area, northern gannets knife into the water. There is a small herd of caribou living in the area, and a few moose can also be seen from time to time.

The limestone barrens on the Northern Peninsula are home to many varieties of calcium-loving plants, some of them found only in this environment, so it's necessary to tread carefully on the plateau above the shore. Just up the road, also part of the Port-au-Choix National Historic Site, is an interpretation centre that concentrates on the area's remarkable human history; a succession of occupations of the area by various cultures go back some 6000 years.

The nearby towns of Port au Choix and Port Saunders are centres for fishing in the area, and there are restaurants, hotels and other services nearby.

A miniature garden among the rocks

Window on the Ancient Past

A couple of hours south of St. John's, the community of Portugal Cove South is the gateway to two important sites, Cape Race -- the Marconi station where the last signal from the Titanic was received -- and Mistaken Point, where the fossils of the Ediacaran biota, Earth's oldest complex lifeforms, can be found. This site is a true treasure, considered significant enough to be featured in Sir David Attenbrough's presentation, First Life. You'll see his visit to Mistaken Point at minutes 23:25 to 36:00.  All visitors to the fossil site must be accompanied by trained interpreters; a guided visit takes place each day, starting at the Interpretation Centre for the Mistaken Point Ecological Reserve.  The site is reached on foot, by way of a coastal trail that leads to the sloping

sandstone and mudstone layers that house the deposit. Some 560 to 575 million years ago, this area was at the bottom of a deep ocean, far beyond the level to which light could penetrate. The Mistaken Point Assemblage is made up of over 30 soft-bodied species that existed millions of years before animals developed skeletons.  They were preserved by a series of undersea volcanic eruptions that covered them completely in layers of ash, and eventually the seafloor containing those layers was thrust upward to its present position.  While other deposits of a similar age exist, the grouping of lifeforms at Mistaken Point is unique. This rugged and
often fog-shrouded coastline is now on a list of nine potential UNESCO World Heritage Sites within Canada.

Much of our knowledge of Ediacaran fossils at this remarkable site comes from the research of Dr. Guy Narbonne, Professor and Research Chair in the Department of Geological Sciences and Geological Engineering at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario.  Dr. Narbonne is a world-renowned specialist in the origin of animals, whose description of the unusual fractal nature of the Ediacaran physiology was hailed as one of the top 100 science discoveries of 2004.

The fossil beds are located at the edge of the Eastern Hyper-oceanic Barrens ecoregion, noted for its distinctive low-growing vegetation and balsam fir tuckamore.  The walk to the fossil beds is approximately 45 minutes in each direction over rolling and uneven ground, with two stream crossings.  Be prepared for the cool, damp weather that's common to the area.