The stump was then towed downriver and loaded onto a truck for transport to the RAM, where it is currently housed.

They used straps, slings and winches to lift the 3034 kg trunk from the river bank to a wooden barge. Staff of the Royal Alberta Museum (RAM) and Royal Tyrrell Museum recovered the stump in 2012.

A local guide on the Athabasca River reported the find to authorities. However, the largest piece ever found in Alberta was a tree stump measuring 2 m across and 88 cm tall at its highest point.

Most often they are no bigger than cobbles (less than 30 cm in diameter). Because these pieces have been removed from their original position in the sediment and are mixed with rocks of different ages, it can be challenging to know how old they are. Throughout other areas of Alberta, eroded pieces of petrified wood are commonly found in gravel pits and along river banks. The badlands of Dinosaur Provincial Park have yielded petrified wood from the age of dinosaurs (photograph courtesy of Travel Alberta and Jeremy Klager). This kind of research continues to uncover more information about ecosystems of the past and provides context for other organisms, like dinosaurs, that lived in Alberta at this time. Ancient conifer trees that are similar to modern pine, cedar and redwoods are some of the species that have been identified in Dinosaur Provincial Park. Similar to how people study modern trees, the species and cross-sectional growth patterns of petrified wood can give us information about the climate of a region when the tree was alive. Palaeobotanists, people who study ancient plants, have used well-preserved pieces of petrified wood to gain information about past environments by looking at thin, cross-sectional slices under a microscope. Petrified wood from the Cretaceous period, 65 to 145 million years ago, is one such type of fossil. Some petrified wood is so thoroughly silicified that it is smooth and uniform in composition while other specimens are platy and retain the layers (‘laminae’) of the original wood grains.Īlberta is world famous for the incredible dinosaur fossils that have been found in places like Dinosaur Provincial Park, but the badlands of Alberta are also home to some spectacular plant fossils that lived alongside dinosaurs. The bottom eight images are microscope photographs showing the variability of petrified wood in Alberta. The top image is of a polished cross-section (cut) through petrified wood. Weathering can also affect the colour of petrified wood, sometimes appearing bleached due to prolonged sun exposure.įigure 2. Pure quartz, for example, is colourless but can be a variety of colours when small amounts of certain elements are included in its crystal structure. The colour of petrified wood depends on the composition of the minerals present. Many varieties of chert, flint, and other silicified organic material look similar and can even exhibit banding that closely resembles tree rings. Without these remnant features, petrified wood can be mistaken for a number of silica-rich rocks found in Alberta. Wood grains and tree rings can be preserved in the rock and are the most useful features for identifying a specimen as petrified wood. Quartz and other varieties of silica (SiO2) are the most common minerals: these fossils are said to be silicified. Depending on the chemical composition of the groundwater, silica, calcite, pyrite and a number of other minerals can petrify wood. During replacement, decomposing plant tissues are gradually substituted with minerals, which replicate the original structure in remarkable detail. During permineralization, the internal and external features are surrounded and encased by minerals that have crystallized out of solution. Both of these processes take place at the same time and involve the flow of groundwater, rich in dissolved minerals, through the wood. Petrifaction of wood involves two processes: permineralization and replacement. Examples of raw petrified wood cobbles and pebble from Alberta. Petrified wood is a 3-D fossil that can appear like modern wood at first glance. Petro (meaning ‘stone’ in Greek) is the root word of petrifaction, the process whereby an organism is mineralized or turned to stone. Designated as Alberta’s official stone in 1977, petrified wood is part of the geology, palaeontology and archaeology of the province.

Petrify wood