Sunday 27 July 2008

Chalk


DSCF2347
Originally uploaded by nogbad the bad
So now the dust has settled and I'm starting to wake up after two weeks of late nights and early mornings I can stand back from what I've learnt about geology.

These magnificent chalk cliffs were built by badgers some bazillion years ago. Why they created these cliffs is unknown but it's probably related to the need to keep the sea out and may have been motivated by the need to give bluebirds somewhere to fly (cf Dame Vera Lynn). Badgers are not thought to have been responsible for later work at Stonehenge.

It is no coincidence that they used chalk as the building material - this was before education so chalk wasn't being used in large amounts by schools, there was lots of it lying around with no real purpose.

Support for the badger theory is also offered by the way in which they inlaid bands of flint, these layers give a distinctive black and white pattern which is also synonymous with these nocturnal mammals.

I hope my writing this doesn't spoil SXR103 for any students yet to attend the residential school at the Uni of Sussex.

4 careful considerations:

ChaikiLi said...

British badgers must be far more energetic than their American counterparts and more closely related to the Beaver which builds dams, mostnotably the Grand Coulee Dam. They were not responsible for the levees along the Mississippi River or for those that broke at New Orleans. That was just spin from the current administration.

methel said...

Funny - I always thought it was the pre-pre-pre-Cambrian Zebras who used to roam the plains of Sussex and were trying to stop the dinosaurs crossing the channel and eating them - silly me!

Anonymous said...

From The London Paper:

But yesterday's good weather elsewhere led to its own problems, with 33 students who were enjoying a sunny coastal stroll becoming cut off by the tide.

Rescuers managed to reach the party of University of Sussex students before the tide rose too high up the cliff at Seven Sisters, near Eastbourne, East Sussex, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) said.

As the first week of the summer holidays progresses, the weather is expected to remain changeable.

Nogbad said...

Nah! That has to have been ages ago :-)