Desert scavengers

Alright so I have a simple problem because Geography is not my strong suit. In one of the areas of one of my currently running stories I want to introduce a desert area which is ripe for the picking for scavenger raider types. The thing I'm having trouble with is that I want this area to have a fossil rich earth and was considering making it limestone, not sure how well that would work in a desert biome though. If anybody has any suggestions for anything different I'd appreciate it.

If the desert was a former sea like the Sahara then it's fairly plausible to have fossils. However, keep in mind that there is little to scavenge in a desert so most of the income will be raiding trade caravans passing through or selling water from oases.

Edited by Belisaurius on Oct 15th 2019 at 9:52:17 AM

Oh the issue of what to scavenge I've already got covered, plenty of wrecked equipment there, thanks though.

Well, you’ve got to consider what the scavenger lifestyle entails. It’s not a primary means of sustenance. Are they scavenging metal for trade or for craftworks? There’s not much food in the desert, so if they’re not trading what they scavenge to buy food they’re likely also farmers or hunters on top of scavengers.

A quick look at Wikipedia doesn't give a direct answer, but it does mention that the sand in deserts comes from "harder granites, limestone and sandstone" (emphasis mine). (From the second-to-last paragraph of the "weathering" section of the article on deserts.) The inclusion of limestone in that list seems to imply that it's not an outlandish material to find in a desert.

And—admittedly speaking as a layman—I see no reason offhand that a desert shouldn't have limestone. As Belisaurius mentions, if the desert was a sea in a former geological age then it seems entirely plausible that limestone might be found there.

Edited by ArsThaumaturgis on Oct 15th 2019 at 7:47:16 PM

Most real-life fossils are found in multilayered rock formations in the middle of rocky deserts. There are some formations that are surrounded by sand dunes, like the Flaming Cliffs in Mongolia's Gobi Desert. These are usually very old sediments with sandstone or claystone foundations, which stayed put as the ground around them was eroded away over tens of millions of years.

If limestone is present, then that implies that the desert was a sea floor that dried out fairly recently. One example is the Nullarbor Plain in Western/South Australia, which has the largest exposed limestone bedrock in the world; most fossils found in both states are marine animals from the late Neogene, as you could probably guess. This type of desert would have hard, very flat ground with little ground water or vegetation, though being close to the sea might help moderate its climate a bit.

Edited by eagleoftheninth on Oct 15th 2019 at 4:34:05 AM