Susan Hoi, Krabi

Susan Hoi (GPS: 8.02258, 98.8831), or Fossil Shell Beach (literally Seashell Graveyard), is located at Ban Laem Pho in Krabi, in the vicinity of Hat Noppharat Thara - Mu Ko Phi Phi National Park. Susan Hoi is a matter of curiosity and although visitors to Susan Hoi are told that there exists only two other similar sites in the world, one in US and another in Japan, most are either engrossed to this or totally indifferent.

The age of the fossils at Susan Hoi is placed as about 40 million years ago. At that time, Susan Hoi was a large freshwater swamp. Eventually, it became landmass. Over time, successive layers of shell created rock slabs known as "shelly limestone" of over 40cm. These rest on 10 centimetres of lignite, below which was subsoil.

Due to geographic upheaval, this shelly limestone at Susan Hoi is now distributed in great broken sheets on the seashore at Laem Pho. They look like broken chunks of cement flooring from afar.

There are three sites at Laem Pho to view the shells.

Susan Hoi Site 1

Site 1 is located west of the Visitor Centre. It crops out as a rocky beach and can be clearly seen during maximum low tide. The pan-shaped outcrop is the result of the sinking of the underlying claystone beds. The fossil bed consists of stubby-shaped gastropods (Viviparidae family) ranging in size from 1-2 cm.

Susan Hoi Site 2

Site 2 is located at the Visitor Centre. It is exposed as a 1-2 m thick limestone bed. This limestone bed contains millions of compacted gastropods and is underlain by 20-40 m thick lignite and claystone beds. These beds are easily eroded by wave resulting in the collapse of the gastropod beds.

Susan Hoi Site 3

This site can be accessed along the track during low tide. Mollusc beds at this site are approximately 3 m thick, consisting of long gastropods and bivalves. The gastropod fossils from this site range in size from the stubby 1-2 cm to the elongated 4-5 cm forms.

Strata of these three sites of Susan Hoi are interpreted as having been deposited in fresh-water lakes during 35 million years ago. Deposited events are summarized as:

Susan Hoi is on the map of Krabi Province

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Hello and thanks for reading this page. My name is Timothy and my hobby is in describing places so that I can share the information with the general public. My website has become the go to site for a lot of people including students, teachers, journalists, etc. whenever they seek information on places, particularly those in Malaysia and Singapore. I have been doing this since 5 January 2003, for over twenty years already. You can read about me at Discover Timothy. By now I have compiled information on thousands of places, mostly in Peninsular Malaysia and Singapore, and I continue to add more almost every day. My goal is to describe every street in every town in Malaysia and Singapore.

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