Mistaken Point - An ecological reserve in Newfoundland and Labrador, known for its evidence of some of the oldest life forms on Earth, has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Mistaken Point geologist Richard Thomas said the UNESCO designation is the most prestigious recognition a fossil site can get and it will have an important effect on the reserve.

"There's going to be a big influx of visitors," said Thomas. "We're expecting visitation to increase greatly."

There will also be much more worldwide scrutiny of Mistaken Point, he added. "The provincial government now has a duty to protect and monitor and present the site to the world," he said.

Mistaken Point, on the southeastern point of the Avalon Peninsula, is home to the oldest-known evidence of Earth's first, large, complex, multicellular life forms — a 565-million-year-old sea floor that holds a collection of fossils known as the Ediacaran biota.

The first fossil at Mistaken Point was discovered in 1967 by Memorial University graduate student S.B. Misra, and the site was declared an ecological reserve in 1987.

Mistaken Point takes its name from the way sailors would, in foggy weather, mistake it for nearby Cape Race and turn north, expecting to turn into Cape Race Harbour but running into rocks instead.