| Fossils of Western New York (from the Penn Dixie Quarry in Hamburg, New York) |
| Rock Layers |
| The fossils at the Penn Dixie Quarry are located in layers and layers of shale. The shale layers are on a tilt and located underneath the shale beds is a layer of limestone. The layers are tilted due to earth forces such as glaciers. Shown in the picure below the different layers of shale and the layer of limestone. |
 |
| Types of Fossils |
| Different fossils are found in the Penn Dixie Quarry. The fossils are of the Paleozoic Era, mainly from the the Devonian and Silurian Era. The fossils were once marine organisms such as horn corals, brachiopods, and gastropods. These fossils are shown in the picture below (Figure 1). They're 443 to 362 million years old. At the time they were deposited, the area was a shallow tropical sea (being 20 to 30 degrees south of the equator. The fossils are in shale, which was once mud. |
 |
 |
| Organisms from the Devonian Period |
| Figure 1 |
 |
| Penn Dixie |