Location: The Fossil Park is located 110kms north of Cape Town, only one and a half hour's drive along the R27. Turn off on the R45 towards Hopefield.

The West Coast Fossil Park, a component of Iziko: Museums of Cape Town, offers students, school children and the general public an opportunity to have an on-site fossil experience. People can learn about ancient environments; the animal life and the climatic changes that occurred in this region 5 million years ago.

The first phase of the West Coast Fossil Park was launched by Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, Dr Pallo Jordan on 22nd September 1998. Guest speakers included Mrs Evita Bezuidenhout, Dr Mike Cluver, Mr Mike Salamon, Mr Wynand Dreyer and Ms Laurine Platzky. A test trench was excavated by a contract Archaeology team from UCT and the remains of several extinct giraffes called sivatheres were uncovered and left "in situ" for public viewing. This first phase also included the renovation of the old Chemfos mine office block to provide a display area, lecture room, laboratory, offices, tea room, curio shop and research accommodation for a team of up to 12 people.

Please visit the park's Official Website for all relevant visitor information

Or you can phone the park on: 022 7661606 for more information, to arrange school tours or group bookings. The park also have a coffee shop that serves light lunches.

These fossils represent the remains of plants and animals that lived about 5 million years ago, a time when the environment of the Saldanha region was very different from that of the present. The study of these fossils, and the deposits in which they occur, by palaeontologists and geologists from many local and foreign museums and universities has made it possible to reconstruct in detail the nature of a rich and varied flora and fauna, and of the conditions under which this biota flourished.

The phosphatic and fossiliferous deposits at Langebaanweg were laid down during a period when the sea rose well above its present level, inundating the area between Saldanha Bay and St Helena Bay. The mainland coast followed a line of granite hills north and south from Langebaanweg, the place at which the Berg River then had a mouth. A few kilometres offshore were a series of islands formed by the high ground around Vredenburg and southwards to Ysterfontein. These islands were the home of seabird colonies, which included several species of penguins, petrels and prions living in an association reminiscent of those found today on Subantartic islands such as Gough and Marion. These islands were also the home of an extinct seal that is related to the living crab-eater of Antarctica. The island fauna indicates that the local sea temperatures were then as cold, or colder than those of the present.

Many of the seabirds and seals crossed the narrow channel from their island homes to feed in the Berg River estuary on the mainland. Some died there and had their remains preserved as fossils in the deposits that are now being mined for their phosphate content. Also preserved in these deposits were the remains of estuarine life, ranging from microscopic one-celled organisms (foraminifera) to whales. However, most of the fossils found at Langebaanweg have come from deposits laid down around the estuary and in the channel of the river that led into it. The former include tidal mudflats, saltmarsh and floodplain deposits, each of which has preserved a distinctive suite of fossils of some of the plants and many of the animals that lived in these environments. In addition, the river channel deposits also include the remains of animals washed down from inland habitats. It is the concentration in a limited area of life from a variety of environments that has made the Langebaanweg fossil assemblage so remarkably diverse.

Over 200 animal species have already been recorded, of which about 80 are mammals, the group that is by far the most abundant in terms of specimen numbers. Hundreds of thousands of mammal bones and teeth have been collected, of which only a part have been cleaned, repaired, sorted and studied. To date, the studies have involved more than 30 scientists from 15 institutions in eight countries and are far from being completed.

Apart from the marine species already mentioned, the mammals include freshwater forms (e.g. hippopotamus), inhabitants of coastal and riverside forests (e.g. giant pig), and grasslands of the interior (e.g. hartebeest-like antelope). Some species, such as a small baboon, are rare and are known from only a few specimens, whereas others are represented by many thousands of specimens. The latter include a sivathere, which is an extinct member of the giraffe family that had a short neck and large “horns” (ossicones), and weighed as much as a rhinoceros. Remains of more than 500 sivatheres were found in one of the river channel deposits. These animals were apparently drowned in floods and represent what is known as a “catastrophic mortality”. They inhabited areas of open woodland together with a long- necked giraffe that was very similar to the living species. A third species of the giraffe family is an okapi-like form that had dense forest as its habitat.

The giraffes and other large herbivores were preyed upon by one of the most unusual mammals recorded at Langebaanweg, a bear of gigantic proportions. This animal is the largest terrestrial carnivore known to have inhabited South Africa during the past 65 million years. It was the first bear recorded in Subsaharan Africa, and the only other one of it’s kind on the continent was recently found at Sahabi in Libya. Interestingly, although it is 7000km north from Langebaanweg, Sahabi is the only other significant fossil occurrence in Africa of similar age and with comparable depostional environments. However, there are many more fossils known from Langebaanweg and its recorded fauna is much more diverse.

Other unusual mammals represented in the Langebaanweg fauna are a giant wolverine, sabre- toothed cats, a three toed horse, and a small peccary. The peccary has since been described as a dwarf pig. The nearest living relative of the wolverine is found in arctic regions, while peccaries are now confined to parts of North and South America. The sabre- toothed cats, three- toed horse and other mammals such as the sivathere have no living descendants, but relatives of many of the Langebaanweg species still occur commonly in Africa today. They include an aardvark, foxes, mongooses, elephant, dassie, rhinoceros, and a variety of antelopes and rodents.

Scores of species of birds, reptiles, amphibians, fishes and invertebrates are also known from the Langebaanweg deposits. The birds are of particular interest since they represent one of the largest and most diverse assemblages of fossil birds known in the world. With the exception of parrots, all the groups still have living relatives in the western Cape. The parrots are an example of more tropical forms of life that had survived in the region from an earlier period when temperatures had been higher. The fall in temperatures in southern mid-latitudes and related changes in ocean currents, wind systems and rainfall patterns, was a direct result of the glaciations of Antarctica, a progressive event that had reached a climax a million or more years before the Langebaanweg deposits were laid down.

The climate of the western Cape today is characterized by cool, wet winters and hot, dry summers, but 5 million years ago the rainy season was during summer. Burnt fossils are common in Langebaanweg deposits, and they are evidence of frequent veld fires that were caused by summer thunderstorms. The present vegetation of the Langebaanweg area is of the fynbos type, and it lacks indigenous trees, but at the time the fossils were deposited, forests, woodlands and grasslands, covered the area and it probably resembled parts of the present tropical east coast of Africa. Subsequent climatic changes, coupled with the recent catastrophic impact of human activity, have converted the area from a wildlife paradise to one of near desolation.

Reference: Education and Culture – March 1984
Modified: March 2005