ASSATEAGUE — Providing further evidence man’s interactions on Assateague Island are comparatively short-lived, scientists at the Smithsonian have confirmed a fossilized blue crab claw found on the barrier island could be as many as two million years old.
Earlier this year, an intrepid hiker was walking the beach at Assateague as she typically does, picking up trash and rescuing overturned horseshoe crabs and such, when she came across the interesting find. The object appeared to be a fossilized blue crab claw, but she was uncertain what it was and how old it might be.
The hiker reached out to the Smithsonian to help identify the item. A paleontologist from the Smithsonian’s Department of Paleobiology was able to identify the object as, indeed a fossilized crab claw. The Smithsonian’s paleontologist responded to the fossilized blue crab claw’s finder.
“My colleague and I are quite certain that your specimen is a fossil crab claw,” he wrote. “Given the nature of other fossils found in your area, the fossil is likely Pleistocene in age, or two million to 12,000 years ago.”
The correspondence from the Smithsonian paleontologist explained the distinguishing characteristics of the find.
“The extra rock around it is a very well consolidated matrix that was so hard it didn’t readily erode,” the response reads. “The claw did erode a bit though, which is why it isn’t immediately distinguishable as a claw. The tips are gone and parts of the infilled area where the original flesh would have been has shown through though, making the whole specimen look a bit odd.”
The paleontologist explained fossils found on public lands are protected by the 2009 Paleontological Resources Preservation Act and advised her to return it to the source. The finder did return the fossilized crab claw and it now part of the Assateague Island National Seashore’s small collection of fossils.
