The Fernie Ammonite is a giant from the Jurassic seas. Titanites occidentalis, a 1.4-meter cephalopod fossil from the late Jurassic period, was discovered in the Coal Creek drainage.

This ancient beauty, a carnivorous cephalopod from the Dorsoplanitidae family, lived around 150 million years ago in a shallow sea that once covered much of the region. Titanites occidentalis, also known as the Western Giant, is only the second specimen of this extinct species ever discovered.

The first discovery of this extraordinary ammonite took place in 1947, when a field crew mapping coal outcrops in Coal Creek made an astonishing find. Upon encountering the fossil high on a hillside, the team could hardly believe their eyes. The size and marine nature of the fossil were baffling — how could such a creature, so clearly of the sea, be found atop a mountain? The size of the fossil was so immense that it reminded one of a “fossil truck tire,” a description that captured its massive presence.

Years later, the British Columbia Geological Survey’s paleontologist, Hans Frebold, formally described the fossil and named it Titanites occidentalis after the large Jurassic ammonites found in Dorset, England. The name Titanites is derived from Greek mythology, referencing Tithonus, the Prince of Troy. Tithonus, who was granted immortality but not eternal youth, serves as a fitting metaphor for this ancient giant, whose time on Earth spanned the end of the Jurassic period.

The Titanites occidentalis fossil remains a rare and awe-inspiring testament to the prehistoric life that once flourished in what is now the Fernie region.