The Sixth Canadian Paleontology Conference convened at the Sir Wilfred Grenfell College, Corner Brook, Newfoundland from September 28-30 1996. Its theme - Economic and Applied Paleontology - and the location - western Newfoundland - were chosen in part to expose conference participants to the setting for the recent hydrocarbon exploration activity in western Newfoundland. Over thirty participants from universities, government and industry in Canada, the United States, and from as far away as St. Petersburg (Russia, not Florida) attended. Conference organizers were Drs Henry Williams and Elliott Burden of Memorial University of Newfoundland.

The three day conference included one day of oral presentations and two field excursions to the Port au Port Peninsula, one on the first day of the conference and another on the third day. The first day of outcrop hopping was an excellent ice breaker, a way for participants to get to know the crowd and get a feel for their audience before the more formal technical session which followed on the second day. The Port au Port Peninsula of Newfoundland is a beehive of activity right now with as many as ten companies drilling and bidding on exploration rights - what better way than this to see the geology and find out what all the fuss is about. On the first day in the Port au Port region the sun (along with some of the paleontologists) was splitting the rocks. The second day in the field the drizzle dampened the rocks but not the spirits of the participants. Henry, although failing miserably to push back the tide on the first day's excursion, did come through for the graptolite workers of the world and stopped the rain just in time to view the rather excellent Ordovician graptolites in Piccadilly Quarry. Mini buses and deli style lunches provided by the organizers made the field trips quite comfortable and enjoyable.

There was something in the field excursions for even the most esoteric tastes - the invisible for sampling - acritarchs, conodonts and chitinozoa, and the visible - corals, bivalves, worm tubes, brachiopods, fossilized tree trunks, graptolites and more. Participants saw potential source rocks (black and dark brown shales of the Humber Arm Supergroup) and reservoir rocks (karst features within the St. George and Table Point groups). If these rocks weren't enough to convince those sceptics present of possible oil in the Port au Port region then attitudes changed when they saw the oil well site at Port au Port #1 where the Christmas tree or capped well head still remains as oil exploration continues.

The one day of talks covered everything from corals to coccoliths. Paleontology and hydrocarbon exploration was a common theme. Lower Paleozoic exploration activity in western Newfoundland was highlighted by Louise Quinn, who stressed the role of paleontology in unravelling the timing of tectonic events. Henry Williams and Elliott Burden used conodonts, chitinozoans, acritarchs and graptolites to map thermal maturation, and Helen Gillespie established acritarch zones for correlation with the subsurface. Further afield, Godfrey Nowlan brought us up to date on the new frontiers for Lower Paleozoic oil activity in the Western Canada Sedimentary Basin. Mike Melchin (Gentzis et al.) demonstrated the use of graptolite reflectance in assessing thermal maturation in Arctic Canada. Talks by Sandy McCracken (McCracken et al.) and Chris Barnes on conodonts of Baffin Island and western Newfoundland and the Anticosti Basin, and Terry Poulton (Craig et al.) on Lower Jurassic coccoliths of Alberta, stressed the importance of sound paleontology in exploration activity. Jisuo Jin presented his work on the recovery of brachiopod communities during the Early Silurian on Anticosti Island, and Graham Young integrated data from across Canada to determine controls on Silurian tabulate corals. Peter von Bitter and Paul Schenk presented talks on tube worms and other fossils associated with mineralized deposits and we had a chance to see this odd biota on the field trip the following day. Jean Dougherty (co-author Janet Waddington) warned us of the danger to paleontological collections across the country due to reduced funding. Alex Smirnov (Smirnov et al.) gave the award winning student presentation, not on oil, but on the Holocene palynological history of northeastern Newfoundland and demonstrated that environmental cyclicity correlates with changes in regional cod stocks. Helen Gillespie's talk on Late Ordovician Acritarchs of the Winterhouse Formation (Long Point Group) was the runner up.

Guest speaker Dr Rex Gibbons, the Minister of Mines and Energy for the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, addressed the public on "Oil exploration in western Newfoundland - past, present, and future" and much mingling followed at the reception in the Fine Arts Gallery at Sir Wilfred Grenfell College.

Although there were a small number of participants, the conference members left Newfoundland with a strong sense of fellowship and belonging to the paleontological community. The pristine condition of the environment, spectacular landscape, and the warm Newfoundland hospitality made this one field trip to remember.

Our compliments to Henry, Elliott and those students who helped to make this conference a success.

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This article first appeared in CAP Newsletter 19(2):10-11, 1996.