Limestone

Klara Limestone can be seen in the steep rock cliffs near Porsgrunn and Skien. She is made up of calcareous shells from animals that lived in the sea a long time ago, and contains many fossils.

In a way, I am related to Sara Sandstone. Neither of us have been scary molten rocks under volcanoes, we preferred things a bit calmer.

Once, I was an ancient sea floor. A long time ago, more than 400 million years ago, this place was a wonderful warm, pleasant water teeming with animal life. Sea lilies, trilobites, and other strange creatures that no longer exist. There were even coral reefs. You might be able to find remains of these animals if you look closely at me. I grew layer by layer, as lots of lime mud and fragments of shell piled up. Sometimes, during storms, some sand and clay mixed in with the lime mud. As I got thicker and thicker, the pressure on me increased. The lime fragments “glued” themselves together, and this is how I eventually became what you see today: a beautiful, striped stone that can tell you a lot about how things once were around me.

I’m also quite useful. Did you know that rocks like me are used in cement? Maybe you did, but perhaps you didn’t know that you can also find me in toothpaste or in the paper you draw and write on2. We rocks can be useful for a lot of things. So it might be wise to listen to what we have to tell!