Moving between continents one realises the amount of stuff collected over a lifetime. I really need to lighten the load, while I may part with the objects, the memories of many happy hours spent collecting them will remain forever.
These gastropods were collected from the Gánt bauxite mine shortly after it ceased production in the late nineteen eighties. The silty clays of the Forna formation was once a brackish near-shore environment in the Lutetian-Bartonian (middle Eocene), with a unique gastropod fauna that makes it along Barton and the Paris basin one of the key European Eocene localities. Unfortunately most of the mine has since been re-cultivated, and the fossil beds are no longer exposed except for a small preserved section that is now part of a mining museum where no collection is allowed. This is a rare opportunity to obtain a representative sample from this important locality.
Note that collecting was mostly possible from the spoil heaps of the mine where the clay covering the bauxite was removed, finding completely intact specimens was extremely rare, most collected material was damaged to some degree, with apex and aperture usually found broken, even in museum specimens.
Cantharus brongniarti
A fairly common robust species of
the Forna formation with the best preservation of all, usually found complete. Ten
specimens representing the full growth series ranging from 11mm juvenile through
sub-adult to full grown 44mm adult. Two largest have some repairs and some minor damage, rest complete and undamaged.