Very well said!
Popular places can be picked clean, for sure. The more visitors, the
worse it is (part of the Dark Side of tourism). So more power to the
Bahaman government on this one.
However where collectors are uncommon this is most unlikely to be a
problem, and this is where pseudoconservation rears its ugly head.
Similar things happen where there are land-based reserves...
And "conservation" of fossils in order to "preserve them for our
children" is mindless pseudoconservation, but it is not uncommon. Of
course any fossil exposed is undergoing the process of erosion and
will not be preserved, but destroyed, by its "protectors".
I'm glad that the shore is entirely public in NZ... no private
beaches. Yet. But reserves do exist and paleontologists just have to
ignore the restrictions...
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