Next Peace River Monthly Trip: April 13, 2024 (Paid, Active Members only and water levels permitting)
- Zolfo Springs Guage Next Brooksville Trip: April 17, 2024 (Paid, Active Members only. Limit 20 People)
Next Bone Valley Farm Trip: April 20, 2024 (Paid, Active Members only. Limit 20 People) - Sign up at the April Meeting (Cash Perferred)
Next CEMEX Center Hill Trip: (Earth Day at Center Hill) April 20, 2024 (Paid, Active Members only. Limit 20 People)
Peace River Canoe & Screen Apr. 27, 2024 (Paid, Active Members Only Details in the Chronicles Newsletter)
Check the
Field Trips page or
the Calendar for details!
President's Message
2023-2024 Season
Tampa Bay Fossil Club
People “DIG” FossilFest! (Pun intended)
What a weekend. Once again, another successful FossilFest! I
couldn’t be more pleased with the results. FossilFest had good cov-
erage on both television and social media, and it sure brought in a
good crowd. Saturday started a little slow, but I think we did okay.
Boy, it was a hot one though. Our air conditioning bill was through
the roof.
We have three major goals each year at FossilFest; earn funds to
operate TBFC through the year, teach the public about Florida’s
prehistory, and reach out to new members. We accomplished all of
that! It looks like we had 33 new families join TBFC at FossilFest
and 52 renewals during the month of March. That in itself is a great
success! If you’re one of those new members that signed up for
the adventure, welcome to the Tampa Bay Fossil Club!
Everyone worked very hard, some for three hours, some for three
days (some for weeks and months leading up to the show). I hate
to thank individual volunteers by name in this writing, but I have to
mention a few people here. TBFC Director Joe Branin and David
Faucher spent the night on the FossilFest floor both Friday and Saturday n
ight to stand sentinel for the show. That’s about 56 straight
hours at FossilFest for these guys!
I must thank my wife Seina for working on the volunteer assignments for
months ahead of the show, and many of the other details
at Fossilfest that just seem to “happen” because of her. Every year
for as long as I can remember Barbara Fite has worked on scheduling the
vendors and taken care of many other aspects of FossilFest.
She also handles other problems as they occur during the three-day
event. Barbara and Jerry Zolg spend many hours leading up to the
show arranging and rearranging the floor plan to fit our needs, and
sometimes the last-minute changes that have to happen. Our FossilFest
trailer is 20 feet long and weighs in excess of 6 tons. We
need a huge truck to make that move and for many years Mike Burnett
(and his wife Jessica) have driven from Bradenton, Florida to
pick up the trailer in Zephyrhills where it is stored on the property
of TBFC members Darren and Nicole Watts. By the time Mike
drives to Zephyrhills, hooks up, drives back to the fairgrounds, and
then back home to Bradenton, it’s a eight-hour day. He does this
on Friday, in morning traffic, and then again on Sunday afternoon.
Hidden in all of the excitement of FossilFest is Bill Faucher collecting
money, making change, and getting cash money safely to the bank.
Joe Dumont spent two days at the “ID” table and made sure everything was
back in the trailer on Sunday afternoon. Dr. Bob Sinibaldi
assists me with television appearances and does two presentations
each day at FossilFest. Dr. Leslie Branin hauled a metric ton of
books to the show. Fred Hendershot spent the entire weekend
with kids at the Touch Table. Also working with the kids, was Pat
Appledorn and Debbie Porter who managed the Kid’s Mine for the
entire weekend. It takes a bunch of patience to deal with all of the
excitement in the kid’s area. Marlin Swikert runs the Silent auction
all weekend like a well-oiled machine. And that’s just some of the
big things that get done... I am so sorry I can’t mention everyone
here in this writing.
We had several people travel from out of state to volunteer at FossilFest.
Debbie Porter from Atlanta and John Campbell from
Massachusetts are two I know of.
Again, I hate to mention individuals here because I know I’ll forget
somebody who did an above the “call of duty job” and there were
too many people to name that spent three entire days at FossilFest.
I have to thank all of TBFC’s Officers, Directors, and ALL of the 135
members who volunteered to make the show the success that it
was. We certainly couldn’t have done it without you. If you were
one of the volunteers, thank you. From the admissions, to the silent auction,
donations, club sales, kids mine, set up, break down,
security, and everything in-between, I can’t thank you all enough.
I receive lots of accolades and slaps on the back during FossilFest. I
want you all to know that I always tell everyone what a great support
staff I, and FossilFest, have. FossilFest 2024 was a huge success,
and that’s because of all of you.
So, I have to ask... Are you still tired from FossilFest? Sorry, no
time to sit down; TBFC’s season isn’t over yet.
We’re just getting started!
Read the Chronicles each
month (Members Only), check
the calendar here on the TBFC website, and follow us on Facebook. Also,
please be very cautious while venturing out into the rivers and
creeks. There’s nothing in those rivers worth dying for.
Peace River Canoe & Screening Day
The Peace River Adventure has turned into one of TBFC’s most popular
outings. Years ago we worried if we’d get enough participation
to make the event even worth the work. Then we worried if we
could accommodate everyone who wants to attend. That was before
COVID though, and hurricanes, toxic algae blooms, and now
winter/spring rains.
We’ve hoped to run the entire weekend event in 2024. However, it
appears that water levels may be too deep. At the time of this
writing the measurement at Zolfo Springs is nearly 7 feet. We need
it at 6 feet, or below to hold a safe hunt. Despite that, we will press
forward in attempting to hold an advertised day of hunting for our
new members that we pick up during FossilFest. These folks will be
biting at the bit to get out and hunt some fossils and we will be
ready for them.
We’ll watch the weather and water levels and shoot for a day of
canoeing and/or screen washing on April 27.
In closing, I want to again say thank you again to everyone who
helped this past month. Thank you for making FossilFest, and everything else
about TBFC so great.
I look forward to seeing all the new faces at the April meeting.
Good Hunting,
Mike Searle
Missed a meeting or just want to watch
it again? You can view our past meeting recordings or live streams in the playlist below (Also found in the About section):
If you’re new to TBFC, prepare yourself for Dr. Bob. If you already
know Dr. Bob, you know that you can expect to learn a lot from his
presentations. You also know to expect a lot of humor and anecdotes mixed
into the good science he presents.
This presentation will take you through Dr. Bob’s “life story” in
paleontology. From finding his first fossils on a canoe trip with his
wife Mary, to authoring several published books on the topic of
paleontology.
Dr. Bob is an important part of TBFC and how we operate through
the year, so come out and see him on April 6.
Tampa Bay Fossil Chronicles
Hopefully you’ve noticed that TBFC has stepped up its game with
the newsletter each month. In addition to all of our regular
contributors, we’ve added two new recurring articles this season. “In
Touch with Inverts” by Rob Carlson was added in September. Recently added, “Paleo Analysis” by Steve Vicari.
Each month Steve will be discussing interesting prehistoric fauna and how they
relate to extant species.
Please check out all of the articles in each
issue. Only TBFC members receive the Chronicles, we don’t post it online or on Facebook.