History of Calvert Cliffs

The Miocene epoch took place during the Tertiary period. Calvert Cliffs provide a window into this epoch. These cliffs store some of the best preserved fossils of the Miocene epoch in the world. In the Miocene epoch, the area including southern Maryland all the way to Washington D.C. was covered in ocean water.  As millions of marine creatures died, their skeletons and shells became covered in sediment and turned into fossils. These fossils and sediment make up Calvert Cliffs. The cliffs stretch from Fairhaven in Anne Arundel County to Drum Point in Calvert County. The fossils in the cliffs are mainly oceanic creatures and are millions of years old. Most of the creatures that have been found in the cliffs have been gastropods and bivalves, but a few vertebrate animals, including dolphin and whale skeletons have been found. Most of the creatures that were found in the cliffs are now extinct but relatives of different types of the creatures still exist, like chesapectens and astartes.

Definitions:

Chesapectens-the scientific name for a type of scallop that lived during the Miocene epoch

Astartes-the scientific name for a type of clam that lived during the Miocene epoch

Miocene epoch-the time period that took place during     c.24,000,000 - 5,000,000 bp

Tertiary period-the time period that the Miocene epoch took place.

Here is zone 19 at Matoaka cabins the youngest zone in Calvert cliffs.

Bibliography-http://www.bowdoin.edu/~dbensen/Spec/Miocene.html (Daniel Benson and Brian Choo)

http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/cenozoic (2005 Merriam-Webster)

                  

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