What’s worth more, poop or iron?
It depends on how old the poop is, and the iron is in the form of a meteorite. And what you mean by "worth", too.
At an auction in New York, two pieces of 130 million-year-old fossilized dinosaur poop sold for $960. These are called coprolites, and are actually rather cool. I’ve seen some before*, and if you can get past the idea that they came out of the butt of an animal — even a dinosaur — they’re really interesting.
But at that same auction, a rare form of meteorite did not sell. I can guess why: the expected selling price was well over $2 million! I was curious when I read that, but then I saw the picture: it’s not any old meteorite; it’s a pallasite, a rare and extremely beautiful rock. They’re stunning: greenish-yellow olivine crystals are embedded in an iron matrix like a webbing.
Pallasites are chunks of asteroids that got smashed apart in impacts — but not just any asteroid. In this case, the asteroid must have been big enough to have moderate gravity. The iron and other heavier elements began to sink to the core of the asteroid, while lighter elements floated to the top in a process called differentiation. Pallasites either form at the core/mantle boundary, or form when the impact mixed material from the core and mantle. Either way, pallasites come from deep inside a shattered asteroid that was big enough to have planet-like features.
And on top of that, they are simply gorgeous.
And what we have here in this auction is a pallasite over a meter across. I’m not surprised they were expecting millions for it! I’d love to own some nice samples, but I simply can’t afford them. They go for hundreds or even thousands of dollars for good ones the size of a credit card. Sigh.
Anyway, so while the meteorite is worth more than the dinosaur poopy, it didn’t sell. So is it really worth more? Maybe not until it sells. This is like the old question, if a dinosaur poops in the woods, and no one was there to see it, does it fossilize?
Isn’t that how it goes? I get my expressions mixed up sometimes.
I can’t resist linking to Steven King’s most famous line (as character Jordy Verrill) in Creepshow (NSFW language). I thought of approximately eighty bazillion puns to use in this post, but wisely refrained from using them. Except for the title. I caution people to keep it clean in the comments, though I imagine that’s too much to ask. At least try to keep it reasonably clean, OK? 
Tip o’ the coprolite scooper to Larry Klaes.
*Years ago I was summoned by an astronomer to talk with him about joining up on a big project. I sat in his office, and saw lots of little toys and things on his desk. Inside a little plastic case was a lump of rock, and I knew immediately what it was. "Is that a coprolite?" I asked him, and by the look on his face I could tell the position on the project was mine for the asking. Knowing your poop comes in handy sometimes.
May 1st, 2008 at 10:36 am
Don’t you still have the pretty piece of dinasaur poop I sent you from Colorado 2 summers ago? How soon we forget…
May 1st, 2008 at 10:46 am
RE: footnote…
Knowing your s**t works in every field of endevour, not just astromony. You must be careful though. You might be thought of as a corpralagniac (SP?) what with you blog and interest in copralitic matter.
May 1st, 2008 at 10:46 am
Isn’t the spelling “coprolite”?
May 1st, 2008 at 10:49 am
There’s a pub near my work (not far from where you had the Skeptics in the Pub meeting, actually) that has a coprolite in the window. I can’t remember off the top of my head how old it’s supposed to be.
May 1st, 2008 at 10:59 am
Nuts. I need a copy editor. Fixed, and thanks.
Sis, that’s really weird: I don’t remember that at all! I’ll have to go through my stuff and look. I have a pile of rocks and meteorites spread out over my shelf… and one of these days I’ll put together a Flickr set and blog post about them.
May 1st, 2008 at 11:05 am
Is it me or is there a British influence in your turn of phrase lately?
May 1st, 2008 at 11:14 am
What if a coprolite was ejected from the earth by a meteorite impact and then returned as a meteorite itself? How much would that be worth? I don’t believe mathematics has a big enough number to describe its worth.
May 1st, 2008 at 11:19 am
Well, the *shape* came out of an animal’s butt.
May 1st, 2008 at 11:27 am
Weird, I was just showing my three-year-old pictures of coprolite in a dinosaur book last night. That wasn’t the sole intention of course, we were just flipping through the book looking at pictures and happened across the coprolite. Still, he thinks poop is funny.
May 1st, 2008 at 11:29 am
Considering the impassioned plea to keep it clean in the post and in one a few days ago (which ran me afoul, oops!)… Imagine my surprise when Phil’s swearing in the post’s title. Wondered why the blog was being blocked at work for inappropriate language.
I wonder how much it’d cost to transport a few tons of valuable meteorite *anywhere*?
May 1st, 2008 at 11:29 am
Shite… wank… what on earth happened to you in the UK? I’m waiting for an article about space boobs next.
Are you lookinging for a job with the tabloids? despite their names The Sun or The Star really aren’t up your street.
Martijn O
May 1st, 2008 at 11:38 am
Wow! Dinocr*p. That must be quite the log.
BTW, the spam filter keeps blocking me. I don’t think I’ve sent swearing messages before?
May 1st, 2008 at 11:46 am
Hmmm, I’ve noticed you’ve turned into a bit of a “potty mouth” since you visited these shores too, Phil; you’re starting to sound like Father Jack from “Father Ted”!
Seriously, be careful, or you’ll find schools blocking you. Just a thought.
Meteorites are great tho, aren’t they? I have a very small collection and get a real buzz from showing them when I give talks in schools. The kids’ eyes just light up when they hold a piece of what blasted out Meteor Crater, and my tiny (and I mean tiny!) pieces of Mars dust from the Zagami meteorite always make a huge impression. Haven’t got any dino dung tho, will have to get me some of that…
May 1st, 2008 at 12:44 pm
I’m guessing that there are more pallasites in the solar system than coprolites in the solar system. That may explain why the poop commands a higher price than the rock. We are conveniently in the place in the solar system where the concentration of coporlites is highest…
May 1st, 2008 at 12:45 pm
And it’s Stephen King, not Steven.
May 1st, 2008 at 1:03 pm
I’ll bet Stephen Colbert will have a special Spoor Report on this!
May 1st, 2008 at 1:12 pm
*Fizzygoo begins working on making his own coporlite to be presented to BA’s fossils, ashes, or progeny in a few hundred million years from now as a sweet gift from the remote past.*
May 1st, 2008 at 1:25 pm
Fizzygoo:
Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww! Just Ewwwwwwwwwwwww…
May 1st, 2008 at 2:29 pm
Phil,
There are more movie lines concerning meteorites and poo from the movie, Joe Dirt. Those are NSFW too.
May 1st, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Let me try that link again:
Joe Dirt
May 1st, 2008 at 2:37 pm
By the way, see Joe Dirt before you would even consider
seeing Expelled.
May 1st, 2008 at 2:50 pm
This wins!
I now have a mental tool in my arsenal that allows me to tell my boss that he/she is full of pallasites!
I can adjust my meaning of worth based on their knowledge and ability to investigate subtle references!
Wait. That’s just wrong.
Coprolite!
May 1st, 2008 at 4:02 pm
If a credit-card-sized pallasite is worth six figures, here’s what to do with the metre-long one:
1. Take out a loan for two mill.
2. Buy the metre-long pallasite.
3. Break it up into credit-card-sized lumps.
4. Sell each credit-card-sized lump for a six-figure sum.
5. Repay the two-mill loan.
6. Never work again.
The same principle is used by property developers.
As for the copralite – it’s a good thing nobody stepped in it.
May 1st, 2008 at 6:18 pm
Thomas Siefert asked:
Is it me or is there a British influence in your turn of phrase lately?
Bathroom humor: it’s not just an American-Standard.
May 1st, 2008 at 6:24 pm
Dude, I actually bought a small piece of coprolite. I use it as an “old crap” (or more explicit term) joke.
It’s polished on the cut side, with a crappy (lol) exterior.
Ah, coprolite, the only piece o’ poo that hurts when you hit someone with it.
May 1st, 2008 at 6:25 pm
@Ronn Blankenship
*groan* Nice one.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:36 pm
They should have taken a really close-up picture of the rock and said that you can see the face of baby Jesus. Fools would have been tripping overthemselves to pay the millions.
May 1st, 2008 at 10:00 pm
I used to have a coprolite when I was a kid. My fourth-grade teacher wouldn’t believe me when I told her what it was. I’m not really sure what happened to it, unfortunately.
May 1st, 2008 at 10:55 pm
The BA noted :
<Pallasites are chunks of asteroids that got smashed apart in impacts — < but not just any asteroid. In this case, the asteroid must have been big < enough to have moderate gravity. The iron and other heavier elements
< began to sink to the core of the asteroid, while lighter elements floated < to the top in a process called differentiation. Pallasites either form at
< the core/mantle boundary, or form when the impact mixed material
< from the core and mantle. Either way, pallasites come from deep
< inside a shattered asteroid that was big enough to have planet-like
< features.
And that source asteroid is Pallas – one of the larger & first discovered main belt asteroids I’m guessing – hence the name?
Incidentally since the Kuiper-Edgeworth disk is much larger in size & mass than the inner Mars-to-Jove asteroid belt shouldn’t that be called the main asteroid belt?
Cool story & pics Phil.
Gotta say I’d rather have a Pallasite than a parasite – or coprolite!
May 1st, 2008 at 11:03 pm
Just a thought but do we have any idea or calculations on how large the original Pallasite source body would’ve been before it got broken up?
Larger than Ceres? Size of the Moon? Size of Pluto? Or Charon or ..?
Interesting thought too – is the asteroid belt (both asteroids belts really) getting noticeably smaller over the millennia along with the size of the largest objects in it as impacts erode down the size & mass of the largest objects?
May 1st, 2008 at 11:13 pm
As for the use of the Swearese languaue : Tche, tche! (tish tish!) Dr BA!
Didn’t you just post everyone your :
“NO SWEARING! NO SWEARING! Naughty! Naughty! Umah! Omah!”
rules again the other day?
Would’ve expected a far more ‘Ned Flanders’ like use of euphemism’s to cover real wordsfrom you BA. At least the use of ‘Shi-ite’ for *that word* rather than just its Scottish form. Tut, tut!
& ‘crap’ it seems is okay … ?
I pity the descendents of the good Dr Thomas Crapper, whose ancestor invented one of the best, most revolutionary, most health-helping of things ever [the flushing loo] – only to have his name turned to ..well .. something far worse than mud!
May 2nd, 2008 at 1:31 am
Hey Phil,
I just clicked on the photo of the Meteorite and read the article on the News Daily site and I have to say, that’s the biggest Fukang Meteorite I’ve ever seen!
Russ B.
May 2nd, 2008 at 2:12 am
Richard H. said:
Ah, coprolite, the only piece o’ poo that hurts when you hit someone with it.
How about “blue ice” when it falls from an airliner?
May 2nd, 2008 at 8:55 am
Hey, Phil.
As a beginner meteorite collector, I’d love to see a write-up of the ones you have. I’ve got a few smallish Sikhote’s (including one with a nice hole), a golfball-sized Campo, a chunk of Brenham pallasite, and a really nice NWA 869. I even made my girlfriend a necklace using a heart-shaped 869 with peridot stones around it.
Also, I have a coprolite on my desk at work. My boss and I got into a discussion about young-earth creationists (we’re both on the same side of the issue) and I told him that I have a piece of poo older than their earth!
May 4th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Must…resist…no…can…not…ARGH!
OK, here is the joke:
You have seen coprolites before? Like, when they were fresh?
OK, now hit me with a meteorite…