Hello,


There is a large excavation going on in Ashfield Shale at the moment at the
supermarket in Baulkham Hills.

I have made enquiries and find that the machinery all ceases after 4:30
p.m. ... and also that potentially access to have a look around could be
allowed therefore in the late afternoon of any day. Anyone interested in
Baulkham Hills, maybe contact me privately.

Also, I have just .. quite accidentally .. come upon a truly giant shaft
dug right down through the Ashfield Shale, to a depth of 25m deep, right at
Ashfield itself (in Queen Street). It has a full scale large bucket
excavator working down the bottom of it, however they got that down there!

The shaft is for works under construction to drop the stormwater run-off of
(new?) urban development around the Liverpool area down to a sewer main (in
the a 'century old' brick and concrete-lined tunnel system under Sydney).

If anyone is interested in going down this shaft I will try to arrange for
that with Sydney Water for party trip access for later this year, probably
for June of July. You are extremely unlikely to find any fossils or ever
to be allowed to touch the walls, but also extremely likely (I would guess)
to see the typical (and widespread?) thing sideritic beds which are the
rock type most likely to preserve fish bones in the Ashfield Shale.

From what little I have learned to date there are the hard band(s) just
above where the tunnel is, one of the employees telling me that they struck
harder stuff "like basalt" which was the first material they had to
specially break during the excavation.

I am intending to visit Sydney Water geo section (they have two geologists)
in the next 1-2 weeks and can discuss this with them then. You could try
to do the same I guess separately as a FossilClub approach to them, or if
the number interested is small just come as LachlanHunter associates.


Best Regards,



John Byrnes

(LachlanHunter geologist)



LachlanHunter Associates
PO Box 121
Burwood, NSW 1805
Ph: (02) 9747 3701