2006
Tumbler Ridge Museum Foundation
When our volunteer fossil prospecting crew goes on fishing trips, they head to the mountains around Tumbler Ridge. There have been several exciting finds made in the area; the most exciting to date by Sheena Walkley in 2006. She discovered a new family, genus, and species of a new form of coelacanth (a type of lobe-finned fish). It is so different from previously discovered coelacanth fossils that coelacanth researcher Andrew Wendruff named it Rebellatrix, the rebel coelacanth. This fossil changed what was previously known about coelacanths in the Triassic Period (about 230 million years ago). It was thought that this order of fish was extinct, however, two species (now endangered) were discovered in 1938 and 1998.