Time seems to stand still when you’re dealing with increments of a million years. Maybe there’s some perspective to be gained by standing on the beach holding a 15 million year old tooth in your hand, knowing that it has survived volcanoes, and ice ages, storms and wars and mass extinctions.

Similarly, five hours on the coast looking for fossils goes by in the blink of an eye. At times, walking the beach with your eyes glued to the ground feels like a walking meditation. You have to be “present” to spot the little dark triangles–the fossilized shark teeth–that you’re after. At other times it’s adventuring. Wading in the surf, scrambling over downed trees, slipping on soft, bluish-gray clay. It’s a mix of different sciences–geology, paleontology, meteorology, oceanography, etc– with long lonely walks on the beach.

While I didn’t really understand this when I began the project, the Fossil Hunters series is about passion. The hobby seems to attract passionate people (some may say “obsessive”) of all ages and backgrounds who want nothing more than to spend hundreds or even thousands of hours on the beach and creek beds, day and night, literally leaving no stone unturned. Some love the hunt. Others love the science, the latin names, the eras and epochs. For others it’s a romantic idea of finding something that hasn’t see the light of say in 10 million years. A welcome distraction during this pandemic era, it’s no surprise that the hobby has exploded in popularity since covid, getting people of all ages outdoors at no major expense other than time.

Passion is also contagious. Even now, I’m not sure if I’d shooting the project to support my photography career, or using my photography career to justify a new hobby. But passion can also lay dormant, buried under the weight of the daily grand. When I was ten years old I was sure I was going to be a paleontologist. The plan was to discover my first new species by twelve, and then find a real living dinosaur by fifteen. Part of what attracts me to fossil hunting is how it taps into my younger self, reminding me of less complicated times when my “job” was just to learn and explore.

This is part One of the project. Check back!