Stories of Sea and Stone
Open Country
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The Disappearance of Burrowing Creatures in the Oceans
A mine in Yorkshire is going down a kilometre to target salt at significant depth. The borehole we were looking at, you're going down only really, I suppose, 180, 200 metres below the surface. But then you've got a continuous record that goes right through a load of the Jurassic rocks. What's that been telling you about the oceans? Well, I'm particularly interested in burrowing creatures. And the reason for that is that they will be creating structures in the mud or the sand, which can get fossilised. So why and when do the burrowing sea creatures disappear? We think driven at least partly by volcanic eruptions elsewhere in the world.
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