Canadian Rockhound: Salmon Fossil Find

This past winter, being exceptionally mild, my son Paul (11) and I decided today was as good a day as ever to start to field-train our black Labrador, "Nick". We chose a secluded place along the southern shore of Kamloops Lake in British Columbia. After several attempts of trying to get Nick to fetch a simple stick, I gave up in frustration. However, my son continued, only this time by skipping a flat stone across the water that he picked up earlier. The dog would not budge - Paul's efforts to skip the stone were in vain. In steps, Dad had to show an 11 year-old how to skip stones. Once I held it in my hand, I realized that it was no ordinary skipping stone. The shape was not quite right, and, in fact it was not a stone for throwing across the water, but some type of concretion.

Oncorhynchus nerka (Salmon) Salmon fossils.

Upon further examination, I discovered a small crack all away around the circumference of the stone. When tapped on the crack, it split open. Now I understood why the others didn't skip over the water. It was a perfectly preserved salmon head, complete with teeth, gill coverings, scales and all of its original bone structure!

My first reaction beside amazement was "Where did you find this rock?"

My son's casual reply, "Oh, just over the railroad tracks, there are piles of them laying around".

Without a moment of hesitation I was up and over the tracks as fast as my feet could carry me, and sure enough there they were scattered around all over the place. We couldn't pick them up and split them open fast enough. Then I realized that these fossils should not be split open in the field - that pleasure should wait until you get home. Careful identification procedures were used without the loss of any valuable pieces at home. That night we split open approximately twelve salmon, but who was really counting. We had salmon heads, salmon dorsal fins, salmon tails every piece of a salmon you could think of and I can thank it all to that dog, Nick, the black lab that would not chase a rock.

Salmon 1
Fig 1. Complete fossil, unsplit.
Size: 21" L x 4 5/8" W at the head.
Salmon 23
Fig 2. Complete fossil, unsplit.
Size: 17" L x 4 3/4" W at the head.

Salmon 24a

Fig 3. Split fossil. Size: 20 1/2" L x 5 1/4" W at the head
(showing whole specimen).

Next morning, over breakfast, my Paul and I wondered if there might be more salmon fossils further inland from the railroad tracks. We were not long finishing our breakfast and packing a lunch for the trip back down to the lake. We located our first site - no problem. We headed towards the mountains, stopping to examine every rock and stone in our path. We hiked right up to the sloping face of a steep hill - no luck.

Just as I was looking up the face to see how far the climb would be to the top, there were the salmon. There lying on their sides, length-wise, half-embedded in the hard clay just as the previous salmon pieces were trapped in.

With more patience than I ever knew I had, we ever so gently removed the hard clay that trapped these salmon for thousands of years. The first one extracted was one my son was working on patiently for about 2 hours. Finally, it came loose in his hands. It was a complete fossilized salmon broken in only four places, but still complete and unsplit. This prize measured 21" long from head to tail and shaped as though it just jumped out of the water in a perfect arch (see Figure 1). Digging now at a feverish pace, we unearthed another three salmon - completely intact and ranging in size from 15" to 20" (Figures 2-6).

Salmon 25
Fig 4. Complete, unsplit.
Size: 13 1/8" L x 2 3/4" W at the head.
Salmon 26
Fig 5. Complete, unsplit.
Size: 18 1/2" L x 3 1/2" W at the head.

Salmon 24b

Fig 6. Split. Size: 20 1/2" L x 5 1/4" W at the head.
Tail and overall skeleton can be clearly seen.

By this time, the sun had already slipped behind the mountains and the temperature had dropped considerably. During our hunt for these salmon fossils, time and temperature went unnoticed. Once home with our newly found treasures, we gently soaked the fossils over night in warm water hoping this would dislodge the sticky clay that entombed them. Sure enough, the next morning with a bit of soap and a soft scrub brush they came as clean as the day they died there.

As the winter progressed we did manage to get out to the site several more times and were never skunked. There was always a head, tail or a dorsal fin to be found (see Figures 7-9 below), and yes, another whole salmon or two were found. However, as winter dragged on we found less and less but felt the cold more and more.

We made a few trips to the dig this past summer, but did not find anything exciting. However, you never know what you might find in the next overturned shovelfull of clay, or what's around the next inlet along the shores of Kamloops Lake.

Similar Findings

Similar salmon fossils were found, and identified as Oncorhynchus nerka in the 1970's by the late Richard Hughes (geologist and paleontologist) near the same area that Paul and I first discovered them. However, none compare to the complete salmon fossils we found. A whole and complete specimen has never been found in North America previously!

Thankfully, professor Ken Klein of the University College of the Cariboo in Kamloops, B.C. recently found similar salmon fossils in the area and had them carbon-dated between 15,480 and 18,110 years old.

Salmon 33

Fig 7. Split. Size: 13 3/8" L x 3 1/2" W at the head.

Salmon 34

Fig 8. Tail, split. Size: 3 3/8" W x 3 1/8" L.

Salmon 36

Fig 9. Head and dorsal, split.
Size: 10 1/2" L x 3 5/8" W at the head.

Photos of these salmon are also available on my web page at www.ocis.net/~ratcliff/index.html.

Reference

Klein, K. "Life In Stone": A Natural History of British Columbia's Fossils. pp. 22-244.

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