Research paper
The negligence and lazy of the Administration: the greatest danger to the conservation of unique sites of exceptional preservation
EDUARDO J. MAYORAL
Department of Earth Sciences, Faculty of Experimental Sciences, Campus El Carmen, University of Huelva, Avda. 3 de Marzo, s/n, 21071 Huelva, Spain. mayoral@uhu.es
CCTH – Science and Technology Research Centre, University of Huelva, Av. Fuerzas Armadas s/n, 21071 Huelva, Spain
Corresponding author
ELADIO LIÑÁN
Department of Earth Sciences-IUCA, University of Zaragoza, E-50009 Zaragoza, Spain; linan@unizar.es
ANA SANTOS
CCTH – Science and Technology Research Centre, University of Huelva, Av. Fuerzas Armadas s/n, 21071 Huelva, Spain. asantos@dgyp.uhu.es
ABSTRACT
An example is given of one of the most important sites in the Spanish fossil record, such as the almost a hundred moulds of ancient jellyfish of hydrozoan Medusozoa, Cnidaria, exceptionally preserved in an arkosic greywacke bedding plane of the Corduban/Terreneuvian Epoch (lowermost Cambrian) in the municipal district of Constantina (Seville). In spite of its scientific-patrimonial importance and the fact that it has been brought to the attention of the Andalusian autonomous administration for more than twenty-five years, it has still not been the object of an adequate legal protection figure. This lack of interest or bureaucratic slowness iscausing an irreparable loss in many of its elements affected by erosion and the passage of time. A series of urgent actions are also proposed to mitigate the current deterioration of the site and favour its conservation.
Key words: Palaeontological heritage, administrative inaction, fossil jellyfi sh, Lower Cambrian, Terreneuvian, Constantina (Seville).
How to cite: Mayoral, E.J., Liñán, E. & Santos, A. 2019. The negligence and lazy of the Administration: the greatest danger to the conservation of unique sites of exceptional preservation. Spanish Journal of Palaeontology, 34 (1), 85-94.
Received 7 February 2019, Accepted 12 May 2019, Published 30 June 2019
https://doi.org/10.7203/sjp.34.1.15243
