Pictures from Week 2

Week 2 group outside the main lodge at YBRA.








Betsy starting her field jacket.







Dinosaurs Unearthed product placement. Thanks Brian!








Future paleontologists enjoying the pig races.









The Dino Wheel. Part gurney, part muscle.

Between a rock...

Week 2 participants have been unearthing fossils left and right! Don't worry Week 1ers, you paved the road!

Recently, we've hit calcite dykes and hard limestone in the struggle to trench around fossils. But with a little elbow grease and help from our trusty air hammers, we'll show those hard areas who's boss.

By this picture alone, you can see that we are well on our way collecting many specimens both large and small from Mother's Day. So far we have extracted gastroliths, ribs, cervicals, a femur, and a radius, just to name a few.

We are still discovering more new fossils each day and Week 2 participants are working steadily to get as far as they can during their last day in the quarry. Tomorrow, they will depart YBRA for the real world and we will welcome a few young ladies from Cincinnati Museum Center's Youth Volunteer Program for a week of learning and discovery.

Field Jacketing 101

Many ask how we transport our incredible finds safely home to Cincinnati. Well, here is your chance to discover the magic that happens behind-the-scenes and in the field!

How to Field Jacket your fossil:
1-Find your fossil!
2-Carefully uncover it
3-Create a trench around the fossil






4-Map the fossil's location in the quarry and record your notes
5-Apply wet toilet paper completely covering the top
6-Layer strips of burlap and plaster to create a temporary cast


7-Mark your jacket with the site code
8-Undercut the matrix below your fossil, flip and repeat steps 5-7
9-Crack the remaining plaster off your hands and clothes

Tada! You have gathered, recorded and unearthed a fossil!

Our fossils are then transferred to the labs at Cincinnati Museum Center to await careful prep from staff and volunteers.

Plesiosaur^2

Pictured above is the Plesiosaur cast located in Museum of Natural History & Science at Cincinnati Museum Center. The cast represents a skeleton in excellent condition, with all the bones accounted for and in a wonderful position for exhibition. Fossils at Mother's Day Site our not found in such a simple way. They are unearthed in a "Pick Up Stick" fashion with pieces missing here and there.

Pictured below is our new Plesiosaur Site. Each green marker indicates bone and our crew is uncovering more each day. We are still in the early stages of uncovering this area and hope to collect the fossils before we leave. We have also found ammonites. Their spiral shape is undeniable and they are sprinkled in pockets on the local farm.

We are very lucky to have two sites running at once and it is a true credit to our participants and volunteers who have worked tirelessly to assist us. Thanks to all!

Welcome Week 2 Participants!

This is the lovely sign that greeted the Week 2 Participants last night. Yes, we have had multiple black bear sightings at YBRA. The bear has only tried to enter the kitchen and not anyone's personal cabin. It has even announced its arrival by ringing the dinner bell outside the main lodge a few nights ago! Not to worry, no one has had any close encounters.

This experience also allows you to enjoy the flora and fauna of the area. At YBRA, you can see: black bears, hummingbirds, woodpeckers, wild turkeys, the occasional moose and more all from the comfort of your rocking chair on their large, cozy back porch.

From the Beartooth Plateau you witness this amazing 360 degree view of Montana & Wyoming. However, just under foot is some quaint but beautiful flowers, as well as orange lichen!
The Field School is more than unearthing dinosaur bones, it is about experiencing things that can take your breath away, learning new skills and creating memories.

Dinosaur Field School - Week 1

Everyone hard at work in the quarry







Joey & Paul creating a trench around their fossils








Week 1 Participants with the Field Crew










Farewell Pig Races

The Crew's New Dinosaur Tattoos

Just kidding!

To celebrate our Dinosaurs Unearthed exhibit, Cincinnati Museum Center printed out thousands of temporary dinosaur tattoos for young and old visitors alike. I brought some out to Montana and the crew applied them last night during our big Friday night dinner. The Stegosaurus's belly is the facade of Cincinnati Union Terminal! I know, you want one too.

The crew would like to say "hi" to their moms. And don't worry, the tattoos will fade before they come home...or will they?

(Above, crew member Sharon McMullen proudly shows off her new ink)

A Plesiosaur & More...

Dr. Storrs has just been given permission to unearth a Plesiosaur skeleton in Montana! A local rancher will allow Cincinnati Museum Center Field Crew to uncover and remove the Plesiosaur from his property to be prepped, studies and displayed in Cincinnati. Plesiosaurs were aquatic reptiles from the Cretaceous. This carnivore currently is under a few inches of dirt and plant roots and is embedded in shale. In our Museum of Natural History & Science, there is a replica of a Plesiosaur skeleton, which can be found in our exhibit, Creatures of the Ancient Seas. I will ask a museum staff member to take a picture of the cast, so we can post it on the blog. We will bring the group out today to see our new fossil!

Officers from the Bureau of Land Management visited the Mother's Day site yesterday. They were given a tour of the quarry and photo documented the area. They also mentioned that they may install cameras around the site to monitor it in the off-seasons. Their office falls under the U.S. Department of the Interior, which issues our excavation permit every year. If our Plesiosaur happened to be on Federal land, we would also have permission from their office to remove it, for the Plesiosaur is located in the same county as our permit.

Today, is the last day our Week 1 participants will work in the quarry. There were sad looks at breakfast this morning, for most want to stay on and keep digging. For their last night in town, we will take them to a time honored Montana tradition...pig races!

Dinosaurs are loose in Cincinnati!

Cincinnati Museum Center is looking for our missing dinosaurs!!! Visit our website to join the search:

http://www.cincymuseum.org/explore_our_sites/special_exhibits_events/current_exhibits/dinosontheloose.asp

Happy Hunting...

Dinosaur Field School is in full swing!

Currently, I'm borrowing wi-fi from a tiny cafe near the site because our connection at YBRA has been to slow to add new posts or pictures.



The first week of Field School participants have arrived and they are having a great time!

Sunday - Everyone arrived safely in Red Lodge and settled into their cabins at YBRA and enjoyed the great view from the main lodge before dinner.

Monday - After breakfast, we headed up the the scenic Beartooth Highway and crossed into Wyoming. There, Dr. Storrs gave a geology tour on the Beartooth Plateau at 10,000 feet! The view was incredible and everyone could not stop taking pictures. It is so cold, that we parked our van next to a glacier!!

Tuesday - We headed back into Wyoming and took the group to Clark Fork Canyon to see it's amazing geological features. The shear size of these outcroppings are breathtaking. A variety of formations are exposed and pushed up into a almost vertical position.Then the group was able to get their hands dirty for their first day in the site. Each paired up with a crew member and started to expose bones.

Wednesday - It was a great day for digging. Cloudy and breezy, the site felt to be in the mid-70s. We were baffled, for the weather is never this kind to us. Each participant found their special place in the site and spent the day uncovering their bones. Making huge progress, Janice, D.M. and Mike got to field jacket the first bone of the season. When it was time to leave for dinner everyone wanted to stay and keep digging!

Thursday - I just dropped the group off at the site and we expect to map and field jacket more bones today.

10 years at Mother's Day!

We kicked off Fourth of July with a bang by opening the Mother's Day Site for the 10th year in a row! Very view sites can still uncover so many great specimens year after year, so we consider ourselves very lucky.

First order of business is to cover the site, which is easier said than done. It is an intricate quilt made of tarps, bungees, rope and metal stakes. This will keep our site shaded while we work. Once the tarp was patched, we tied the edges to large rocks and inserted rods and PVC pipe to keep the tarps above our heads. We dubbed it "the big top" for it's massive circus tent appearance.

Then...we started...to dig!!!

The site was covered with feet of fill and we had to move a lot of dirt, filling 5 gallon buckets, one at a time. The key is to careful skim the surface to make sure we do not split a fossil in half with your shovel or trowel. We made huge progress yesterday and I am very proud of the crew. Bones were flagged and more should be uncovered later today.

(Right: Crew member Lamont Meadows searching for fossils)

We have arrived!

Yes, we made it safely into camp last night. Dale Gnidovec, Collections Manager & Curator at Ohio State University also arrived in camp to be part of our crew. After a slight run in with a deer he still beat us to camp. Don't worry, Dale is fine, but his car will need some TLC. He will be prospecting for new fossil sites while in Montana. We will eventually run out of fossil specimens and will need to relocate our efforts, whether we like it or not.

This morning, Pat, our cook, triumphantly entered camp and will start cooking tonight. Then the crew unloaded our trailer and started opening the site, not an easy task. Every year we have to recover the site completely to prevent looters and/or exposure to the elements.

Today, Dale, William, Dr. Storrs and myself went up to YBRA (Yellowstone Bighorn Research Association) to collect field items that we had stored away last year. We filled our van and truck with buckets, field toilets, coolers and more. After trying with no luck to establish Internet connection at YBRA we headed into Red Lodge for lunch to get better wi-fi. An added bonus is the annual Red Lodge 4th of July parade is happening right now outside our cafe. You know you're out west when every parade participant is on horseback.

I will post pictures Sunday!

Home Away From Home

I'm just posting to let everyone know that the crew has safely arrived at the dig site, as of about 6:15 p.m. Mountain Time (8:15 p.m. Cincinnati time) on July 2. From what I've heard it was an uneventful trip and everyone is chomping at the bit to get started. I'll let Lauren fill in the details when she gets a chance.

Montana, here we come!

We departed Tuesday for "Big Sky Country" in pursuit of research and fossils! Our crew includes: Sharon, Mike, Lamont, William, Mark, Dr. Storrs and myself. Additional crew will meet us at Mothers' Day Site.

Our caravan headed west through Indiana, Illinois and Iowa. Until we hit Iowa, the drive was very, very flat. In the end, it made everyone appreciate Cincinnati's seven rolling hills.

Last night, Lamont took his first stab at Indian cuisine and then we stopped and camped in Rock Creek State Park in Kellogg, Iowa. It is a beautiful camp site that overlooks the creek. The crew happily poured out of the van when we arrived, glad to stretch after 9 hours on the road.

To all crew moms and dads, everyone is safe and we have only been nurturing our addiction to books on tape and gas station snacks.

"Load Day"

"Load Day", the careful dance between safety, necessity and engineering. To pack properly, we store all provisions in waterproof containers. Instant mash potatoes and plaster will be worthless to us in Montana if they get wet on the way out, so everything needs to have a dry home. Then add in your Tetris and Lego skills from your childhood and "poof", you can conquer any load out.

We picked up our rental van this morning and will load it Tuesday with crew and luggage. The truck and trailer were also brought out of storage today and we used spiderweb bungee cords and tarps to secure everything in place. Dr. Storrs will be driving the truck with the trailer and I will drive behind in the van watching to make sure our supplies don't become offerings to the highways' shoulders and median.

We will depart bright and early on Tuesday from Geier and will drive for three days. I will post updates once we arrive in Montana.

This is going to be a wonderful expedition and we hope to bring back many quality fossils. We are also looking forward to meeting our new Dinosaur Field School participants!

Wish us luck!

Sunday, a day of rest

Sunday, is the last full day of rest before we ship out. I, myself, now have a moment of clarity to see what personal affects that I need to bring. But no matter how much you plan or make lists, it can hit you while driving through South Dakota that you forgot your cell phone charger! So, with some forethought, family reminders and Post-its, you pack until your duffel bag is bursting at the seams and your spouse has to hold the sides, while you wrestle the zipper closed.

I image the crew is eating at their favorite native nook one last time, being with their family and possibly taking a nap. A combo that I too will follow shortly.

(Above: Michael Papp, field crew volunteer, exhausted from uncovering a previous find.)

Dinosaur Field School Locker

Today, most of the field crew met at Geier, Cincinnati Museum Center's off-site Research and Collection Facility to prep for our departure. Some crew were pardoned from attending this annual event, due to their distance away from Cincinnati. But all can be forgiven when they haul their weight in plaster up to the quarry (insert wink).

Matt from Britain will be joining the Field School again this year, but as a new crew member! I can happily report that he landed safely in NYC on Wednesday, after crossing "the pond" and grabbed a flight out West. This time he opted not to take the Greyhound bus cross country. We'll see you soon Matt! Safe travels.

Our goal today was to drag everything out of the Dinosaur Field School Locker and decide what to bring, replace and/or purchase. This was a rehearsal for "Load Day" which happens Monday. One always forgets how much stuff is crammed in this tiny locker. It baffles me to watch us unload it, for it is a clown car in disguise. It's cargo fills a truck bed and a 10-foot long trailer to their limit. For the crew, it is like opening a forgotten toy chest. They pull out the treasured contents with glee and say, "I remember that!"

Food, Glorius Food

Ever wonder what the crew members eat in the field when we don't have our beloved cook, Pat Monaco? Well, today is grocery day! I will battle the grocery store aisles to purchase the following in bulk:

• Spam
• Pancake Mix & Syrup
• Sardines
• Devilled Ham
• Gatorade
• Powdered Mash Potatoes
• Canned Chicken & Tuna
• Pasta Noodles & Sauce
• Mac & Cheese
• Chips
• and more...Gatorade

Some of these items might not please your palate, but in the field, these items travel well, stay fresh and can be eaten out of the can or be prepared on a camp stove. After a long day in the field, the last thing on your mind is cooking a gourmet meal.

So...we are super pumped that Pat will be our field cook again this year! She hauls her kitchen trailer all over the country to different dig sites and cooks for the hungry, tired masses. For two out of the five weeks that we are in Montana, she makes every meal feel like Dinner Theatre. From Pat's entertaining antics to awesome cuisine, she does a great job. I actually feared a mutiny from the field crew if she couldn't join us again. Welcome back Pat!

(Pictured above is our pint-sized Grocery Store located in the Duke Energy Children's Museum.)

NAPC at Cincinnati Union Terminal

The 9th North American Paleontological Convention (NAPC) is being held in Cincinnati this month. Many of Cincinnati Museum Center's very own Curators are part of this great gathering, leading workshops and field trips to some of the tri-states' paleo hot spots. It has been an honor to have this Convention in our city, and tonight, the NAPC will host their banquet at Union Terminal.

If you ever find yourself in the Cincinnati area and have not visited Union Terminal, please stop in and see our beautiful Art Deco structure that is home to Cincinnati Museum Center. While you are there, you can visit three amazing museums, catch a film in our new renovated OMNIMAX theatre, or enjoy a special exhibit. We recently launched a new website to ensure the preservation of this national landmark. Please visit: http://www.myunionterminal.org/ to be a star for Union Terminal and share a memory.

Dinosaurs Unearthed is now open through September 7, 2009. It is the first exhibit in the world to have full size, feathered-covered dinosaurs!! The exhibit also houses one of our Paleontology Prep Labs that showcases fossils from Mothers' Day Site! A fantastic exhibit for every dino lover in your family.

The Blog is Back!

Hello! I'm Lauren Scallon, Field Coordinator for the 2009 Dinosaur Field School, under the direction of Dr. Glenn Storrs, Asst. Vice President for Collections & Research and Withrow Farny Curator of Vertebrate Paleontology at Cincinnati Museum Center. This will be my third year at the Field School and I am very excited for the opportunity to join the team once again!

We are gearing up for "Load Day" on June 29 with our Field Crew and so far, we have not stopped packing and planning. It has not been a one man effort, so I would like to thank all the volunteers and staff at Museum Center that have gone "that extra mile" so we could have everything we needed for Montana. From Paleo Bond to toilet paper, if we have asked for it, they have located it. Thanks again! Honestly, I never would have imagined that one day I would be laminating field permits from the U.S. Department of the Interior...


Stay tuned and we will try to post as often as we can. Viva Montana!

2009 Dinosaur Field School

Well, the Field School is looking pretty packed for this summer, with 18 people braving the desert heat and sun over the course of 2 weeks. The crew from Cincinnati will be headed out the last week of June, hopefully arriving for the annual cookout of Bighorn Basin geologists, paleontologists and researchers in Powell, Wyoming.

Dr. Storrs is still assembling his team since a few of us have had to take a break this summer. Mac and Sara, our long-time field crew members are having to attend to their studies this summer, though they'll still be doing a lot of traveling (Mac in the Western U.S. and Sara to Mongolia, among other places.) I, too, will be unable to make the trek with a 10-week-old son at home...but I'll be there in spirit. Mike Papp has volunteered for another year of duty, and I'm sure he'll be just fine with the rest of the crew.

I'm not sure how regularly the blog can be updated this summer, but we'll try to make it exciting when we do!

Home again...

With the aforementioned Internet problems at the YBRA and really NO free time during the last two weeks, I apologize for not having posted. We are all back safe and sound in Ohio as of tonight, but I will still be posting some of the material planned for the past several weeks over the next few nights. SO, just because we're back, don't stop visiting the blog...there will be more to come.

The Death March (a.k.a. The Ring of Hell That Dante Forgot)

Paleontology is not all glamorous, there is a lot of dirt, very hot days, and back-breaking work. However, on July 20th we all got to see a side of paleontology that many of us would like to forget (but none of us ever will).

The Beartooth Butte lies on the Wyoming side of the Beartooth Mountains. Geologically speaking it is a phenomenal location where igneous, metamorphic and sedimentary rocks lie side by side. Paleontologically speaking, it is home to many fossil specimens (primarily fish) which exist in only a few widely spread museum and university collections. On this trip we found out WHY these collections are so rare.

First, imagine a picturesque “Sound of Music” setting where spinning in circles on a mountaintop actually seems like the right thing to do. Melting ice sheets, abundant wildflowers and alpine grasses, the occasional Grizzly Bear track…BEAUTIFUL. The hike across an alpine meadow bisected by a meltwater stream…EXCITING. The majesty of the Butte towering 2000 feet above your head with its talus slopes exposing new fossils every spring…INSPIRING. This is what the first mile, or roughly 45 minutes of hiking, are like.

Now, we hit the tree line where a few million vicious, blood-thirsty mosquitos are waiting for us. Add to that the fact that the fossils slab we had come to find was now covered beneath a few tons of fresh landslide debris and you have the start of an idea of how the rest of the day went. What had been an exhilarating one-and-a-half mile hike to the fossil site became an excruciating three-mile trudge back out using our trusty “dino-wheel” gurney. Time wise, it took 45-minutes to get in and nearly five-hours to get back out.

I asked some of our crew for their quotes to help sum it up:
Mac: “This is Dante’s Eighth Circle.”
Mike: (speaking to the mosquitos as he waves his arm around) “Fly my minions!”
Sara: (quoting a line from The Chronicles of Riddick) “If I owned this place and a place in Hell, I’d rent this one out and live in Hell.”
Ian: “All of this pestilence for some fish?”
Craig: “Uphill bothways just will not cut it anymore.”
Jason: (trying to keep everyone from losing it) “There will be no mutiny on this Bounty!”
Dr. Storrs: (repeated several times, I might add) “From the top of this ridge, it’s all downhill…until it’s uphill again”

BUT, the moral of the story is that we DID find some nice specimens, even if it was extremely difficult to get them out. For those of you eager enough to try hiking the Butte for fossils (with a permit, of course), Dr. Storrs is planning another trip…and at present he has a shortage of willing volunteers.

Week Two...That was fast!

Okay, I know that we have many loyal blog readers out there who have been wondering whether or not the Yellowstone Caldera might have swallowed us up since I haven't posted now in more than a week. We're still here, but a busy two weeks and literally NO days off in more than 4 weeks have been taking there toll...especially on the blog.

Laura, Ruth, Minna, Ian, Kevin and Susan had what I hope was a good week, as well, including some below-average temperatures and a generous quarry. Week Two went exceptionally well, adding 65 new numbered specimens to this year's total. We added several ribs and vertebrae, some exceptional foot elements all found in a single trench, and most notably, some Diplodocus teeth and palate. These were found, of course, by the newbie on the field crew, Craig (he's an archaeology/anthropology student from Ohio University, but we agreed to bring him anyway). He has adapted to the different matrix in which we work pretty well, and has added some levity to camp life.

Dale Gnidovic from Ohio State was with us for a little over a week, but headed back to Columbus after a few days of less than satisfying prospecting and what ended up being a disheartening development with the ranch we were supposed to get onto this year. There are many details I could share, but let's just say that the courts are involved so I'm "not at liberty to discuss" them.

Pat Monaco, who can only be described as a force of nature, also finished up her two-week stay with us on July 19th. We were all sad to see her go, but her sendoff dinner of bison marinara was out of this world. She'll hopefully be visiting us in Cincy in October so that we can show off the fine Cincinnati cuisine of Skyline Chili and Montgomery Inn ribs.

Pictures will be posted from Week Two as soon as I have an extended stay in Billings and can get away from the painfully slow Internet service at the YBRA.

Week Two Starters

Again, still in Billings trying to down my frappucino and get back on the road to the Mother's Day Quarry, but just a quick start to Week Two. We have six anxious diggers joining us this week: Minna, Susan, Kevin, Ian, Laura and Ruth. They all arrived safely on Sunday and were eager to get started digging, so we pretty much went straight to the site on Monday morning and put in a good 6 hours in the 100+ degree temperatures (we measured the ground temperature in the sun at more than 130-degrees).

Today will be their second full day in the field, and Wednesday will be their trip up the mountains to the Beartooth Plateau. In addition to the amazing geology, they will also find that the wildflowers are at their peak and quite beautiful.

Susan, Kevin and Ian have had the best luck thus far, uncovering 2 nearly perfectly preserved metacarpals and an associated ungal (toe) bone. Minna has been busy with some rather curious pieces, while Ruth has been following some pretty fragile fossils down into some very hard rock. Laura has a busy day of clearing some overburden, but found a rib at the end of day one. Mac, Craig, Mike, Lamont and I were busily trying to get some things out of the ground in an attempt to broaden our excavation area. Dale, Pat and Sara were off prospecting in some of the local Cloverly outcroppings, but had a somewhat disappointing day.

More posting as soon as I can.....

Week One Recap

Unfortunately, Internet access at the YBRA is a little less reliable than it was last year, so I had to stop in at a chain coffee house in Billings after making an airport drop-off this morning (mmmmm...frappucino).

The first week was very successful, recovering 40 numbered fossils and related items. There were also several other plant materials recovered which need some further examination. One of the most common pieces recovered (as usual in the Mother's Day Quarry) were the small, smooth stones believed to be gastroliths (i.e. stomach stones) used by the large sauropods to aid in digestion. For modern examples of this process, we can look at common chickens which use small stones to further digest corn and other grains.

Mark, Kevin, Matt, Sandy and Russ had a great time (I hope), and we added a couple more field crew members in Lamont and Mike, and lost Lauren when she had to return to Cincinnati following a two-week leave from her role at the Museum back in Cincinnati. She was excited to leave some of the wildlife behind, in particular the fierce jackalopes which chased her off the hill on more than one occasion.

The week ended with a trip to the pig races in Bearcreek and an early morning visit to the top of the Beartooth Plateau at about 10,900 feet for a top-of-the-world sunrise on Sunday morning. There are some great images at http://dinosaurfieldschool.shutterfly.com.

I'm going to have to leave it here for now, but will post again as soon as possible.

Some Pictures from the First Days in Camp

(click on image for full-size version)

Bison and The Badlands

Hail at Mother's Day





































Pat Monaco and her camp kitchen

Friday, July 11, 2008

What a week we're having! We've seen extremes in weather (107-degrees on Thursday and a high of around 75-degrees today, rain on Sunday and a dew point of about 10-degrees today, no wind on Thursday and wind gusts as high as 52 miles per hour today). The crew will be back in the quarry for a half-day tomorrow and will get a little bit of "tourist time" in Red Lodge in the afternoon before he ultimate Montana experience of attending a pig race at the Bearcreek Saloon.

I'll be posting some pictures this evening, and even more tomorrow evening along with a final fossil tally for the week, but I hope that everyone has had a great experience with us.

Russ and Sandy got started right away working on a couple of interesting fossils in the softer matrix (i.e. rock) higher up in the quarry. One particularly interesting item was a coossification (fusing of two bones) by what appeared to be a possible cancerous growth. It was very delicate, but they removed the bones like a pair of pros (this is their second summer with us). Kevin and Mark tackled some of the most difficult pieces of the week, which happened to also be in the hardest rock of the quarry. They have already removed a few ribs and some vertebrae, with a few more interesting pieces coming out hopefully on Saturday. Matt has had his hands full with several cervical vertebrae that have fallen victim to the "Mother's Day Curse" in which no one bone seems to come out without first having to remove several others which have been deposited in close proximity.

Mac, Sara, Lauren and Craig have been doing wonderfully well educating this week's crew about best approaches to removing difficult fossils. Ian has been racking up miles of hiking in his attempts to map the stratigraphy of the Mother's Day Site, a time-consuming and hot job.

Hail Storm Video

Here is some video of the hail storm that struck the Mother's Day camp on Saturday, July 5th. There is no audio, but you could imagine what marble-sized hail sounds like on the roof of a 12-passenger van. The tents you see are those of Ian, Craig and Mackenzie. Everything survived.

Yummmmmmmm

Chicken curry, bison marinara, gumbo and beef tips sound like menu items from a fusion restaurant in New York or San Francisco, but they are in fact the menu items from our first few days with Pat Monaco, our field cook for two weeks this season.

Pat has been doing this for a couple of decades, traveling all over the country to serve meals for hungry geologists and paleontologists. In her "free time" she works on oil and gas pipelines doing fossil mitigation...that is looking through the trenches dug by pipeline crews to determine if there are any noteworthy fossils in the path of these major undertakings. It goes without saying, but she is a force of nature and she has won over all of our crew with her sense of humor and her culinary preparations.

No pork-n-beans or SPAM for the next week, thank goodness.

Message from Lauren Scallon

Howdy from Montana! Mom, I’m sorry I didn’t call you sooner. Yes, I am still alive, have bought a knife, shot a gun and discovered a handful of bones! To my dear husband Aaron, I miss you and please keep feeding my cats (and please don’t shave them as you had previously threatened before I left). Big hello to all my volunteers at the Cincinnati Museum Center!! Everyone should put the Dinosaur Field School on their list of must dos. We have had a blast, all the while uncovering dinosaur bones that have not seen the light of day in over 130 Million Years! – Lauren Scallon, Administrative Assistant, Volunteer Services, Cincinnati Museum Center

Sunday, July 6, 2008

Today marks the official beginning to Dinosaur Field School with the arrival of our first group of aspiring paleontologists. Mark and Kevin from Cincinnati arrived at the airport in one piece, while Russ, Sandy and Matt met us at the YBRA Lodge this afternoon. Everyone is settling into their cabins as I type this.

Dr. Storrs, Mac, Sara and Ian are prospecting on the Taylor Ranch near Edgar, MT. This is a prime Cloverly locality with the promise of many good finds to come. Today was their first opportunity to see it in person, and the cooperation of the ranch owner is testament to the quality program that Dr. Storrs and the other scientific staff at Cincinnati Museum Center have put together over the last decade. Craig and Lauren accompanied me into Billings today and our getting spoiled with their second showers at the YBRA in as many days.

We have opened the site, and wouldn't you know it, the fossils are just begging to be unearthed. Several nice limb bones and vertebrae have already shown themselves, onw of which is shwing an interesting pathology...perhaps a cancerous growth...but we won't know more until we get it out.

July 4th was a wonderful day in the Bighorn Basin, capped off by a cookout in Powell, Wyoming at the home of Winston and Beryl Churchill. This cookout traces it's roots to the 1920's, and all geologists and paleontologists in the Basin have an open invitation to attend. Nearly 70 people were in attendance this year, hailing from the Univ. of Florida, Johns Hopkins, the Smithsonian, the Univ. of Washington, the Univ. of Michigan and others. Many thanks the the Churchills for their wonderful hospitality.

July 4th also brought us Pat Monaco. For those of you who have read about our campsite food (beans, spam, spaghetti, etc.), Pat is the answer to our culinary prayers. Her first meal for us on July 5th was chicken curry with brown rice, vegetables and mango chutney. Tonight is supposed to bring with it buffalo marinara. Yummy! Pat is also a great conversation starter in camp. I've never heard any of our crew laugh so hard...

July 5th was a brief work day, followed by lunch at Bogart's in Red Lodge (you have to try the wheat crust pizza), and showers. Throughout dinner we watched a storm come from the northwest. As soon as dishes were washed, the skies opened up with marble-sized hail and about 10 minutes of gully-washing rain and 50-mile-per-hour winds. I'll get some images and perhaps a video posted soon.

Well, the satellite Internet is having issues with the big storm clouds rolling across the Beartooth Plateau, so I'll try to post more this evening.

Greetings from Montana!!!

Well, last year we all became a little spoiled with hotel rooms and wi-fi Internet each night during our trip out to Montana. This year, however, there was no such risk as we camped the whole way out and usually did not even have cell phone reception at night. I will include a synopsis of our journey here, and then every 3-5 days, should be able to add to the blog.

Day 1, June 29: We left Cincinnati, a little later than planned, but had beautiful weather for the entire day. Indiana and Illinois were just as flat as last year, but we were able to see first-hand some of the flood damage across both states, and particularly in Iowa where thousands of people have been forced from their homes and businesses. We ate dinner in Iowa City, home of the U. of Iowa, and the damage was profound. We camped in Rock Creek State Park just north of Kellogg. It was a beautiful park with great camping facilities...I highly recommend it. Remember to ask the rangers about a discount for student groups...

Day 2, June 30: Up and at 'em at 6:00 a.m. and on the road by 7:00. A quick breakfast at McDonald's and on the road again. Another beautiful day for traveling. We bypassed our annual stop at Cabela's and the Corn Palace in Mitchell, South Dakota in order to make better distance for the day. We ended up at The Badlands National Park and camped in the middle of bison country. We have some great photos of our encounter from the car, but did not get photos from camp on the morning of Day 3 when the bison were within 200 yards of our tents.

Day 3, July 1: Up at 5:00 a.m. for one of the most gorgeous sunrises imaginable. We were supposed to be up at 6, but some of our phones are having problems deciding whether we're in Mountain Time or Central Time. On the road by 6:30 and a stop for breakfast in the world's largest tourist trap, Wall Drug. The food was great, and Lauren, Ian, Mac and Sara all contributed to the revenue of the local knife seller. We made great time and ended up at the Mother's Day Site in Montana by 5:00 p.m., just in time for our first wind/rain/lightning storm of the season. No injuries to our crew, but two tents did receive some moderate damage (sorry Ian and Craig). Repairs were made quickly and Sara started on making our first field-cooked meal of the season, Chicken Parmigiana. Believe it or not, it is possible to cook frozen chicken in the field. Dr. Storrs examined the quarry for any signs of damage or looting, and everything was just as we had left it last summer. After a typical Montana sunset (i.e., beautiful) we all settled down for our first night in the field.

Day 4, July 2: I'm typing to you from the YBRA right now. Lauren, Ian, Craig and I came over to pick up some of our gear from last year (and catch a quick shower) while Dr. Storrs, Mac and Sara headed off to meet with one of the locals who has arranged for us to do some prospecting on some ranches in the area. After I finish typing this up, it's back to the camp and haul gear up to the dig site. I will probably be able to add my next post on Sunday after picking up our first group from the airport. Until then....

Welcome to the Dinosaur Field School Blog

The 2008 field season is here, and the blog which was started by Dr. Glenn Storrs in the summer of 2006, is still going strong. In these posts, you will learn about the work of paleontologists...both professional and amateur...on Cincinnati Museum Center's annual pilgrimage to the Bighorn Basin of Montana.

In the right-hand column, you can find archived posts from past seasons and from the "in-between" times when all of the work in the museum and the Geier Collections and Research Center is taking place. Staff and volunteers will be departing Cincinnati on June 29th, and posts will follow semi-regularly over the next 6 weeks as the team makes the 1600 mile trek to Montana and as they continue to uncover the fossils of juvenile Diplodocus in the "Mother's Day Quarry". We will also be including insights from the amateur paleontologists and students joining us.

But most importantly, you (as the reader) can post your own questions and comments. We'll answer every question as we get a chance, and look forward to hearing from you!

Cheers!

One week and counting...

Well, we have 11 staff and volunteers confirmed (Dr. Storrs, myself, Mac, Sara, Craig, Ian, Lauren, Lamont, Mike, Dale and Sam), 18 Field School participants (from Ohio, Colorado, Wisconsin, England and Finland), and a few others who will be joining us over the course of 5 weeks in the field.

As of now, we will be leaving Cincinnati at around 9:00 a.m. on Sunday, June 29th (for anyone who is interested, that's my b-day). We should make Grinnell, Iowa on Day 1, so a few of us are really looking forward to some salsa & chips from "Casa Margaritas".

Most everything is packed, including more dry goods than I think we've ever taken out with us. Kroger's had a big sale on Pringles ($.88 a can), and an "unnamed" bulk food club was the source for the rest, including powdered Gatorade, powdered mashed potatoes, canned veggies (sorry, Sara), canned chicken, pasta, tomato sauce. I was adamant that we save some money on food (since $4.00 gasoline appears to be with us throughout the trip), and Dr. Storrs was insistent that we eat healthy...so, buy in bulk was the answer.

We'll be loading everything up starting on Saturday around noon. It will be the first time that some of our new staff and volunteers will have met, but Sara and Mac (assuming he makes it back from Utah in one piece) will hopefully show the leadership skills they have developed over the past several years. The two of them have really helped keep this program moving forward during recent staffing changes.

I will try to post once or twice more before next Sunday, but with six weeks of being in the desert ahead of me, I'm looking forward to several evenings of soaking in the hot tub and spending some time with my wife and our 20 month old son.

Cheers for now...

Dry Dredgers Trilobite Fossils

Ok, not a dinosaur or Montana, but the Dry Dredgers are a group of amateur Cincinnati geologists and fossil collectors who quite often have displays in the Museum of Natural History & Science and make frequent donations to Cincinnati Museum Center's collections. This is one such display of Isotelus Trilobites...quite phenomenal. This video was shot and posted by one of their members.

10 Years of Grease and Grit

Sara, Mac and I spent a recent afternoon going through all of our field cooking gear. We knew that some things were in pretty bad shape, so that's why we brought it all back to Cincinnati with us this off-season for a good cleaning. WOW! We never expected to find the grit and grease that had created a shellac-like coating on EVERYTHING.

After a bottle of dish soap, scrubbing pads and a lot of elbow grease, Sara ended up pulling out a chisel and rock hammer...and we still couldn't get everything clean. So, we have some more steel wool pads and some more "intense" cleaners in hopes of getting it all clean.

On a more positive note, we will be having a special guest at camp for the first two full weeks...a professional camp cook! Not that we can't fend for ourselves (Sara has learned how to cook chicken parmigiana), but having some well-cooked meals will be a nice step up for those of us on site. For the "Field School" participants coming in from around the country (and Europe), you will also get to join us one night for a field-cooked meal...although it probably still won't compare to the wonderful meals that you will be enjoying at the YBRA camp, lovingly prepared by Jeanette...the camp "mom" who cooks for more than 100 people during peak weeks.

Just 4-1/2 weeks until departure...

Field Crew Introduction: Sara Oser

I am currently a second-year student at the University of Cincinnati majoring in Geology and Physics. I've wanted to be a paleontologist since the fifth grade, and I have been with the museum since my freshman year of high school, working in the paleo lab. This will be my fourth year out in Montana and I honestly can't wait. Its absolutely beautiful out there, and not just to a geologist. Every year my family points out that I come back with more pictures of landscapes, sunsets, and rocks than of people. And the night sky puts Ohio to shame- the field season corresponds with the Persied meteor shower and the plane of the Milky Way arching across the sky is always awesome.
Six weeks left.

Kids and Dinosaurs

Today, I had the great pleasure of connecting via videoconference to about 30 elementary students in Argyle, New York. I've done around 120 similar connections this school year, but this session and this group of students were especially wonderful. These students were eager to ask and answer as many questions as possible, and we ran out of time before we could get to all of them, so I am eagerly awaiting an email from the teacher with more questions.

We all know that kids love dinosaurs. For some, it is a phase--for others, it becomes a calling. Paleontology, as I have said many times on this blog and elsewhere, is a gateway science. Whether it is something as formal as the scientific method or as simple as getting their hands dirty digging in a mock dig site, we (as educators) should try to hook the kids while they are naturally interested. An earlier post referenced the new confirmed DNA link between birds and dinosaurs. While a 3rd grader may not understand how DNA works, they CAN look at a T.rex foot and recognize the similarities with birds sitting on the phone wires while they walked into school that morning, or imagine a Thanksgiving turkey that would barely fit inside a school bus.

If the hits on this blog (50 states and 32 countries) and attendance at Dinosaur Field School (guests from across the country and now Finland and the UK) are any indication, the paleontology gateway has remained open for many of you. Post a comment to let us (and the readers) know why you are so fascinated in paleontology and show the school groups who visit us why THEY should keep paleontology in their curriculum.

T.rex - Bird Connection Confirmed

From the National Science Foundation (www.nsf.gov)

Scientists have put more meat on the theory that dinosaurs' closest living relatives are modern-day birds.

Molecular analysis, or genetic sequencing, of a 68-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex protein from the dinosaur's femur confirms that T. rex shares a common ancestry with chickens, ostriches, and to a lesser extent, alligators.

The dinosaur protein was wrested from a fossil T. rex femur discovered in 2003 by paleontologist John Horner of the Museum of the Rockies; the bone was found in a fossil-rich stretch of land in Wyoming and Montana.

The new research results, published this week in the journal Science, represent the first use of molecular data to place a non-avian dinosaur in a phylogenetic tree, a "tree of life," that traces the evolution of species.

"These results match predictions made from skeletal anatomy, providing the first molecular evidence for the evolutionary relationships of a non-avian dinosaur," says Science paper co-author Chris Organ, a researcher at Harvard University. "Even though we only had six peptides--just 89 amino acids--from T. rex, we were able to establish these relationships."

Continued on the NSF website.

Post Your Questions

As we wait for our scheduled departure date on June 29th (and it can't come soon enough), we would love to hear from you with your questions. What question about paleontology is vexing you? Are you interested in our favorite camp stove recipes? This blog is your opportunity to ask those questions! Ask away by clicking on the "comments" link just below this post and we'll respond with a full post.

cincyevolution.com

Cincinnati Museum Center's science and natural history research departments have inaugurated a new gateway to their latest news and research at cincyevolution.com.

The features of the site include latest publications, updates from the lab and collection inventories. Designed by Curator of Zoology Herman Mays, the attractive, easy-to-navigate site truly makes the collections and research of Cincinnati Museum Center, and its off-site Geier Center, much more accessible.

Field Crew Introduction: Mackenzie English

Hello, my name is Mackenzie English and I am a geology student at the University of Cincinnati. I am also a Paleo Lab volunteer at the Cincinnati Museum Center. I have been working in the Paleo Lab since February of 2005 and I have been to the Mothers Day Site in Montana four times. My first visit to the MDS was in the summer of 2002 and then again in the summer of 2005. During that season Dr. Storrs asked me if I would like to come back the following dig season for the entire season. So for the dig seasons of 2006 and 2007 I traveled to Montana with the CMC. For the 2006 season I worked in the Dodson Quarry until we finished excavating the young diplodocus and for the 2007 season I went prospecting and worked at the MDS. I am looking forward to this season because the I am an outdoorsman and I have been cooped up in dorm rooms and class rooms for too long. I also hope that we find some interesting and good specimens while prospecting and digging at the MDS this up coming season. Plus I really want some of that great field cooked food. Nothing is better than waking up in the morning for refried beans and Spam.

A Few More Voices

In the coming days, two of our volunteers will be joining us online to post about their experiences--from the college geology classroom to the laboratory to the field. Please join me in welcoming Mac and Sara.

Getting Ready for the 2008 Dinosaur Field School

ATTENTION!!! There is still time to sign up for the 2008 Dinosaur Field School. Two sessions are available, either July 6-13 or July 13-20. Call (513) 287-7021 or 1-800-733-2077 x7021.

This year's Dinosaur Field School is shaping up to be one of our most exciting ever. What really makes it so amazing for those of us on staff is the diversity of people who choose to spend a week (or more) of their summer with us. In any given year we can see classroom teachers, engineers, musicians, stay-at-home moms, and anyone from 13 years old to 85 years old (and older). This year we have at least two participants from Milwaukee returning for a second time, and two more coming for the first time from Europe (one from the UK and one from Finland).

Some of our field staff (museum staff and volunteers) will be working on a new discovery made last year in the Beartooth Mountains. Not a dinosaur this time, but an ancient fish...currently "swimming" at around 10,000 feet above sea level. The rest of staff will be digging in at the Mother's Day site and working with the participants from Dinosaur Field School.

There are a few other changes this year...we've moved a little earlier in the season (by about 10 days or so). So, we'll actually be on the ground in Montana by around July 2. This opens up a lot of possibilities for us who are driving out, including one of the largest cookouts you've ever seen on July 4. More news on that as we get closer.

But here we are, in mid-April, waiting for a sustained warming trend in Ohio and dreaming about the 130-degree temperatures we can expect in 3 months or so. We're starting inventories for our gear, reordering supplies and chomping at the bit to get on the road again...

"Taphonomy of the Mother's Day Quarry"

Since we have a wide-range of users visiting this blog, let me first start by defining taphonomy. Taphonomy (tuh-fahn-uh-mee) refers to the circumstances and processes of fossilization. For example, a study of the environmental conditions present when bones or other materials were first deposited and how those conditions affected the process of fossilization.

In 2007, Timothy Myers and Glenn Storrs published their Taphonomy of the Mother's Day Quarry, Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation, South-Central Montana, USA which examines the conditions present at our primary dig site in Montana when the bones of these sub-adult sauropods were deposited some 140-million years ago. This isn't light reading, but for those of you who will be joining us this summer (or who have joined us in the past), it might be of interest.

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.