smithsonianmag.com
may sometimes seem like monolithic, almost mythical beasts, but the statuesque skeletons that populate museums around the world once belonged to living, breathing animals.
hjnews.com
The fossilized tusk of a Columbian mammoth was unearthed in a private gravel pit in the Cub River area on July 19.
theherald-news.com
A historic dinosaur site is getting a second look – and possibly a second hypothesis of how the bones got there.
smithsonianmag.com
Remember Ducky from The Land Before Time? The adorable little dinosaur was one of the duckbills—known to paleontologists as hadrosaurs—that roamed far and wide during the Cretaceous chapter of the great dinosaur story. Duckbill bones are so numerous in some places that these herbivorous dinos are sometimes called the “cows of the Cretaceous.” But what allowed these plentiful, shovel-mouthed dinosaurs to become so successful?
smithsonianmag.com
Dinos didn’t just leave behind footprints and fossil bones—they also changed the landscapes in which they lived.
smithsonianmag.com
In paleontology, you’re always most likely to find something on the very last day of the season. That’s what happened in 2007, when a multi-institution team of paleontologists was poking around Patagonia’s Huincul Formation looking for one last find. “It’s the last day, you’d better find something good!” Field Museum paleontologist Pete Makovicky joked to the team. Then Akiko Shinya, his lab preparator, did just that. A few moments after Makovicky’s command, Shinya found the first signs of an unusual dinosaur with an unexpected connection to the celebrated Tyrannosaurus rex.
smithsonianmag.com
In the solitary hunt for bones, furry companions provide company, act as field assistants and sometimes even make the ultimate sacrifice
sltrib.com
Picture, if you will, the mighty Tyrannosaurus rex.
The odds are good what you envision has been brought to you in part by “Jurassic Park,” a plastic toy or some other facet of pop culture.
sltrib.com
Cleveland-Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry • About 148 million years have passed since dozens of corpses of meat-eating dinosaurs were deposited here, just north of the San Rafael Swell and about 30 miles southeast of Price.
smithsonianmag.com
Finding things trapped in amber is far from a rare occurrence: lizards, bugs, flowers and more are regularly found encased in hardened lumps of the tree resin. But when a group of researchers digging through amber mined in Burma uncovered a sample with a pair of tiny bird-like wings frozen inside, they knew they had something special. At around 99 million years old, these wings are some of the most pristine fossilized feathers ever found.
LEARN MORE ABOUT THE UTAH GEOLOGICAL SURVEY
The Utah Geological Survey (UGS) is a division of the Utah Department of Natural Resources. Several specialized programs comprise the UGS: Data Management, Energy & Minerals, Geologic Hazards, Geologic Information & Outreach, Geologic Mapping, Groundwater & Wetlands, and Paleontology.