Dorset Geologist’s Association Group (DGAG) will host a talk on the Tuesday 17th March 2026.
Title: The Standard Stratigraphic Nomenclature of Offshore Ireland: An integrated Lithostratigraphic, Biostratigraphic and Sequence Stratigraphic Framework
Speaker: Nigel Ainsworth (DGAG member)
Time: Talk will start at 7pm; finish approximately 8pm
Venue: Activity Meeting Room: Dorford Centre, Bridport Road, Dorchester, DT1 1RR
Lecture Entry Cost: All welcome: £6 non-members (£5 for DGAG members), cash best.
Booking a seat: contact Chris Webb at email: events@dorsetgeologistsassociation.org
Talk Description: A modern review completed in 2020 so will be fascinating insight into the geology of one our neighbours!
Speakers’ summary: To be provided nearer the time
Photo: Temporary courtesy of Government of Ireland website pending better one from the speaker
Additional Links:
1. Publication on which the talk is a summary of the work
https://www.gov.ie/en/department-of-climate-energy-and-the-environment/publications/the-standard-stratigraphic-nomenclature-of-ireland/
Dorset Geologist’s Association Group (DGAG) will host a talk on the Tuesday 09th December 2025.
Title: How the famous fish beds of Lebanon have informed on life and evolution in the Cretaceous (provisional title)
Speaker: Hady George is a PhD student in the Palaeobiology Research Group at the University of Bristol. Previously, he completed an Mres in Palaeontology and Geobiology at the University of Edinburgh and a BSc (Hons) in Biomedical Sciences at Queen Mary, University of London. His current PhD project utilises digital & dissection data of the lower jaws of extant fish and amphibians to study feeding evolution across fish-tetrapod transition through a biomechanical approach. He is also actively researching other topics in vertebrate palaeontology including the anatomy and systematics of dicynodonts (stem-mammals) & thalattosuchians (stem-crocodilians), inferring brain evolution from fossils, and of course, the palaeoenvironments and extinct species of the Cretaceous of Lebanon. Hady is originally from Lebanon (British-Lebanese dual citizen), has done fieldwork at one of the four fossil sites (Haqel), works with local fossil collectors in Lebanon, and regularly visits his home where he grew up, which is only an hour away from the exceptional fossil sites
Time: Talk will start at 7pm; finish approximately 8pm
Venue: Activity Meeting Room: Dorford Centre, Bridport Road, Dorchester, DT1 1RR
Lecture Entry Cost: All welcome: £6 non-members (£5 for DGAG members), cash only.
Booking a seat: contact Chris Webb at email: events@dorsetgeologistsassociation.org
Talk Description: The famous ‘fish beds’ of Lebanon, technically classified as the Upper Cretaceous Lebanese Lagerstätten, are world renowned. Hundreds of fossil species are known from these sites, including cephalopods, crustaceans, hagfish, sharks, marine reptiles and pterosaurs. Many of these fossils include soft tissues that almost never preserve, providing key information into the biology of many extinct animals. Besides the enormous number of fossils, the sites yield and their exceptional preservation, the sites are also renowned for their historic importance, as surviving documentation of these fossil fishes was recorded during the height of the Roman Empire and the Crusades. In this talk, the history of discovery and geology of the four best known Upper Cretaceous Lebanese fossils sites (Haqel, Hjoula, Nammoura, Sahel Aalma) will be described and followed by an overview of the great diversity of plants and animals known from the four sites and how they have informed on life and evolution in the Cretaceous. Afterwards, the gaps of knowledge surrounding the sites and their fossils will be discussed alongside potential avenues of research.
Photo: Speaker has supplied a great photo (Nematomotis longispinus), photo credit to Pierre Abi Saad
Additional Links:
1. Speaker as lead-author of 2024 paper in Journal of Geological Society : https://www.researchgate.net/publication/380204734_The_famous_fish_beds_of_Lebanon_the_Upper_Cretaceous_Lagerstatten_of_Haqel_Hjoula_Nammoura_and_Sahel_Aalma
Dorset Geologist’s Association Group (DGAG) will host a talk on the Tuesday 18th November 2025.
Title: Darwin’s “beloved barnacles”; solving evolutionary problems with fossils.
Speaker: Professor Andy Gale (University of Portsmouth)
Time: Talk will start at 7pm; finish approximately 8pm
Venue: Activity Meeting Room: Dorford Centre, Bridport Road, Dorchester, DT1 1RR
Lecture Entry Cost: All welcome: £6 non-members (£5 for DGAG members), cash best.
Booking a seat: contact Chris Webb at email: events@dorsetgeologistsassociation.org
Talk Description: The speaker has provided an introductory teaser diagram and quote for what promises to be fascinating talk about one of early explorers of Earth Science.
2nd Photo: – extract from Chapter 14 by Andy Gale (Page 293) in book: Fossils of the Kimmeridge Clay Formation – Ed D.M. Martill & S. Etches. 2020.
Additional Links:
- Link to an interesting paper from 2023 ; one of many references
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/374613025_Mr_Darwin%27s_Beloved_Barnacles_Using_Cirripedes_to_Understand_Evolution_in_Origin_of_Species
Dorset Geologist’s Association Group (DGAG) will host a talk on the Tuesday 21st October 2025.
Title: From Tethys to the Himalaya — Fossil Fishes Witnessed the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau’s Dramatic Transformation
Speaker: Gengyu Fang; PhD Student in Palaeobiology
University of Bristol; Natural History Museum, London
Time: Talk will start at 7pm; finish approximately 8pm
Venue: Activity Meeting Room: Dorford Centre, Bridport Road, Dorchester, DT1 1RR
Lecture Entry Cost: All welcome: £6 non-members (£5 for DGAG members), cash best.
Booking a seat: contact Chris Webb at email: events@dorsetgeologistsassociation.org
Speakers’ summary – Talk Description: The Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau (QTP) lies at the centre of Asia and averages over 4,500 m in elevation, making it Earth’s highest plateau. Since the Mesozoic, spectacular tectonic events have built the plateau and driven profound environmental shifts, transforming the region from the ancient Tethys Ocean to today’s alpine steppe. However, the timing and mechanisms of uplift, the pathways linking environmental change to ecological response, and the assembly of the region’s distinctive biodiversity remain open questions.
The QTP’s dramatic tectonic history produced a series of sedimentary basins that preserve abundant fossils and record the co-evolution of biodiversity and uplift. Palaeontological research in the region began in the early twentieth century, most notably with the Sino-Swedish Expedition led by Birger Bohlin, who pioneered fieldwork in the Qaidam Basin on the QTP’s northern margin. Over the past century, Chinese and international researchers have continued this legacy, conducting extensive fieldwork and gradually piecing together the QTP’s uplift history.
The presenter is a PhD student in palaeoichthyology whose project applies new methods to re-examine fish fossils from the QTP. Over the past nine years, he has been deeply involved in the Second Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition and Research (STEP), participating in more than ten field expeditions across the QTP and covering strata from the Lower Triassic to the Neogene. In this talk, he will introduce a relative of Helicoprion that once swam in the Neo-Tethys; tropical fish fossils discovered in the plateau’s icy, windswept interior; Pliocene cyprinids adapted to extreme aridity; and records tracing the assembly of modern fish diversity on the plateau. He will also share field experiences— month-long camps in desolate salt deserts, expeditions through the Qiangtang National Nature Reserve, and collaborations with mountaineers at a fossil locality at over 6,000 m above sea level.
Photo: Courtesy of the speaker; An ammonite fossil from the Mount Qomolangma region – ammonites in the foreground!-Editor
Additional Links: Pending
