Monday, January 28, 2008

How hot (or cold) is it in Montana?

One of the most frequently asked questions we get is, "Just how hot DOES it get on the dinosaur dig?" The short answer is "HOT!" A typical July in the quarry can easily see the mercury reach levels as high as 125 to 130 degrees Fahrenheit. Typically, when it's that hot, we put the thermometer away because we don't want to be reminded of how miserable we should feel.

However, it's not always so uncomfortably hot...sometimes it's uncomfortably cold. As I was adding the code for the trackers to the blog, the temperatures in Red Lodge at the Yellowstone-Bighorn Research Association camp were hovering at around 5-degrees above zero Fahrenheit. Over in the Bighorn Basin closer to the actual dig site, temperatures were at 4-degrees BELOW zero.

In order to help all of our readers keep track of what conditions are like, we've added some weather trackers in the right column of the main blog page. The top tracker is for Powell, Wyoming...a nearby town located in the Basin. The bottom tracker is from a weather site located on Mt. Maurice at the YBRA. I have also included them here in this post so that you can take a quick look.