Dinosaurs Galore
Aug.
11, 2023
After the Tetons we went to Salt Lake City so Nancy could do
some genealogy research in the Family History Library.When she had had
enough of that, we headed east. Our next stop was Dinosaur National
Monument, which straddles the border between Utah and Colorado.
The richness of this area for dinosaur bones was revealed when Earl
Douglas discovered eight tail vertebrae of an Apatosaurus in
1909.Eventually, this led to the dscovery of the remains of ten
different species of dinosaurs.
A highlight of the national monument is Quarry Exhibit Hall. It
encloses a rock wall containing more than 1,500 partially excavated
dinosaur bones. Exhibits along the wall identify many of the
bones and the dinosaur species to which they belong.
A section of the wall showing dinosaur bones.
Note the vertebrae joined together (articulated). It is rare to
find articulated sections of a skeleton.
They actually allow you to touch some of the bones. Image touching
a bone that was part of an animal roaming the countryside 150 million
years ago.
The allosaurus was one of the more common predatory dinosaurs in
this ecosystem. This is a cast of an allosaurus from the
Cleveland-lloyd Quarry in central Utah. I wouldn't want to meet
up with one of these characters; he would have me for lunch in no time
at all.