 Alternatively scientists have repeatedly tried to deduce the age of the fossil's layer, using stratigraphic methods.Schoetensack had described the merely ten-centimeter-thick layer of the find as "layer of gravel (scree), slightly cemented due to carbonation of calcium, with very thin layers of clay (Letten), that faintly reacts with hydrochloric acid".Above and below of the finding's strata, sands and other materials had accumulated in various definable layers.