The River
Weather in Texas is unpredictable and sometimes even miserable. Mr. Moser and I have been very intent on adjusting any way needed to accommodate the drastic changes in the weather here. In 2009 the longest dry spell happened and things were miserable. Grass along the highways and East Texas farm roads were brown and dead. Fires were possible. Actually throughout September 2008 thru 2009, the longest dry one year period occurred costing the cattle industry over 0ne Billion Dollars. This dry spell had one positive advantage and we were lucky enough to find out about this tremendous advantage! A friend was our informative messenger who showed and explained the one wonderful great advantage to having a dry spell in our area because of his profession in the wildlife area. Our friend is the official alligator catcher for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department in the East Texas area. If you happen to come across an alligator, they call him to come and capture the alligator and relocate it. Rivers and lakes are his expertise and his knowledge of where they are and where they lead is highly recommended. My only regret during this time was I took very few pictures. Pictures that would have shown how dry it really was then. It was an amazing view to see because during this drought time there was practically no water in this river. An exposed river bottom showing all the rock and even fossils available for anyone to pick up. There were so many that we honestly couldn't decide how many to pick up and bring home! We would make piles of our possible finds and then upon deciding it was time to leave, sort through, trying to determine which of these finds were the best ones to bring back home. These finds were actually real treasures. Education was lacking in our knowledge of fossils and I could only recognize petrified wood, arrowheads, and shells. Loving all kinds of rocks I was able to distinguish a few rocks. Bones and rocks can look a lot alike. Coming home and searching the internet I tried to educate myself as quickly as possible. Discovering so many kinds of all the things nature contains in these objects at one place was quite overwhelming, yet very enjoyable and entertaining. The element of surprise of finding so many treasured finds was very exhausting. Fearing I would be leaving or overlooking something that could be stupendous, kept me wanting to examine each and every item I saw. There was absolutely no way to look at every rock or even bend over and pick it up. Exhaustion sets in quickly and energy needs to be saved to climb back up the extremely steep banks of the river, especially with a heavy load of treasures to take home. Saving time and energy was necessary and making piles of these possible fossils helped. As sunset approaches we would examine our piles of finds again and consult each other on what we would take home. Coming home and cleaning with vinegar, I would then search the internet and try to determine if what I had found was indeed millions of years old. Amazement at the spectacular fossils is still with me today. Experts were the only ones I thought could find and own fossils. This period of time was the only time in my life I appreciated a terrible dry spell!
