It's a breezy afternoon. Your pace begins to match the staccato Pacific surf pounding the Oregon beach beneath your feet. You pick up a round rock to skip across the long stretch of wet beach, arching your arm back for the power pitch of the day. But, something catches your eye, bringing your arm back for a closer look. Say "hello" to Macoma albaria (clam) on the backside of your rock. Before your beach walk is over today, you will find dozens of marine fossils, many over 20 million years old (myo).

Welcome to Lincoln County on Oregon's Central Coast. Lincoln County sits in the middle of the Astoria Formation, fifteen myo sandstone layers mixed with compressed volcanic ash, and Nye mudstone up to 30 myo. These layers expose themselves above sandy beaches cut between the basaltic headlands, forming the larger, more permanent hills along the Oregon coast. The combination of eroding basalt, mud and sandstones produce a combination of rocks and fossils mixing on the beaches with the seasonal sands. While agate-hunters dominate beach-combing in Oregon (especially in spring & summer months), fossil-collectors enjoy year-round availability.

Fossil-collecting on Oregon’s Central Coast is excellent for beginners, teachers and families with kids. Most specimens will be found at low tide on sandy beaches, in creek washes and below rockier headlands in high-tide rock piles. Fossils found on Oregon beaches may be personally collected and traded but not sold. You cannot collect nor take fossils from beaches or signed "marine gardens" adjacent to Oregon State, U S Forest Service or BLM parks, campgrounds and natural areas.

Oregon's beaches are public, however this is not the case with the seawalls above them where people's homes and public highways reside. While seeking fossils on Oregon's beaches, DO NOT use your pick to remove a specimen from a wall. You're breaking the law, eroding the hill and denying the fossil a natural trip to the beach in a couple dozen years. Leave the seawalls alone.

The most common fossil clams found are Anadara devincta, Katerinella angustri, Acila conradi, Macoma arctata, Chione ensifera, Panopea arupta and the scallop Pectins. Common Miocene snail fossils include: Bruclarkia oregonensis, Nassarius arnoldi, Musashia indurata, Ficus modesta, Turritella oregonensis, Crepidula praerupta, Chlorostoma pacificum, Calicantharus carlsoni and Dentalium schencki. Oregon's central coast offers a variety of petrified woods. As ocean currents work their favor on this part of the coast, species from other regions find themselves deposited on-shore. Wood species include pines, alder and myrtle. An occasional (although rare) leaf adds to the collecting experience.

While much has been written about fossilized clams/snails and petrified wood, another collectors’ item – bone-- finds itself washed up on Oregon's Central Coast. Usually deposited in the browner Astoria sandstone, bone fragments are as abundant as Teredo wood and Anadara shells. Look for round, light brown rocks with a darker edge or center. The darker material is usually bone, seldom identifiable, but you can sometimes clean and polish into a displayable specimen. Personal trophy pieces include fish, shark, whale, dolphin and seal vertebrae, rib bones, joints and skulls.

Oregon State University Hatfield Marine Science Center (in Newport) and the Oregon Museum of Science & Industry (in Portland) provide whale-size, hands-on exhibits of marine fossils discovered on these same beaches. You can also check out FACETS Gem and Mineral Gallery located next to the Yaquina Bay Bridge in Newport. Ellen Moore, a former Oregon State University research associate, authored the definitive reference "Fossil Shells from Oregon Beach Cliffs". Sold by many rock shops in the Pacific Northwest, often with author's autograph.

- by Guy DiTorrice

©2000 Guy DiTorrice
Guy DiTorrice leads Oregon beach fossil field trips for other collectors and interested groups.