GSC Guide to Authors - Fossil Reports

Fossil Reports are numbered, unpublished reports by GSC paleontologists and outside consultants that identify and/or discuss fossils submitted by collectors. The Fossil Report numbering system includes author initials, year, and commonly abbreviations for geological ages (e.g. Fossil Report No. J2-1991-TTP, or Fossil Report No. 002-GSN-1991). To assist in the cataloguing of the reports, their titles should be as detailed as possible, including number of fossil collections, geological age, geographic provenance (e.g. geographic name, province, or territory), complete NTS number, year of collection or (re)submission, and name and institutional affinity of the person requesting the report. Where practical, fossil group and stratigraphic unit are useful additions to the title:

Report on 6 Silurian conodont samples from the Allen Bay Formation, Ellesmere Island, District of Franklin, Northwest Territories, collected by T. de Freitas (University of Ottawa) in 1989 (NTS 49 D/10, 49 D/16, 49 F/8).

Immediately following the title of the Fossil Report is the preamble, or qualifying statement, which may vary, depending on the GSC division. For example, the GSC Vancouver uses the following disclaimer:

All references to paleontological data and age determinations must quote the authorship of the report, and the unique GSC locality number of the fossil collection.

Reference to, or reproduction of, paleontological data and age determinations in publications must be approved by the author of the Fossil Report prior to manuscript submission. Substantial use of paleontological and age data in publications should be reflected in the authorship.

In order that curators of GSC collections may update the records to show that a Fossil Report was generated for the localities cited, it is useful (especially in lengthy reports) to list on the first page the GSC locality numbers (e.g. 'Material: GSC loc. C-105021 to C-105055').