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Swimming in Stone: The Amazing Gogo Fossils of the Kimberley

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Swimming in Stone by John Long is concerned with the Devonian age fossil site called the Gogo in the Kimberley Mountains in Western Australia. Here are a great numbers of fish "swimming in stone", to catch them you use a geologists hammer; no bait needed. This is truly an amazing concentration of very well preserved fishes making up one of the most extensive arrays of both endemic species and cosmopolitan organisms of this Period in the world. Because of the excellence of preservation and the large number of individuals, the Gogo is referred to as a Lagerstatte. A Lagerstatte is recognized worldwide as a concentration of fossils representing an ecosystem with particularly good preservation. Gogo (the origin of the name is still not certain) is part of a Devonian Barrier reef; others include the Burgess Shale of the Cambrian, Mazon Creek Flora of the Pennsylvanian (Carboniferous), Solnhofen Shale of the Jurassic etc. The story of the history and development of the Gogo is made fascinating by the excellent narrative style of John Long. Many will remember him for his laudatory "The Rise of the Fishes" published in 1995. It is one of the few books in my library that has been regularly reread many times.
Dr. Long who is now associated with Museum Vicrotia in Australia, has worked over twenty years on the Gogo. Much of this time he was associated with Western Australia Museum and made many significant discoveries among the Placoderms (Armored Fish) which are the most numerous and varied of the fish species as well as the Osteoichthyes (Bony Fish) and even recently found the first Chondichthyes, a shark.
The author takes us on the long, distorted path from the first fish discovered at Gogo by Curt Teichert in 1940 to its present day as a world famous Devonian deposit. He includes interesting biographical insights into the lives of some of the major players in this unfolding drama. It is a fascinating story and even moreso if you can refer to his "Rise of the Fishes" for more detailed information on the evolution of the fishes.