July 26, 2010
Hunting Dinosaurs in Montana
A toe bone from a Tyrannosaurus collected by NJSM paleontologists near Billings, Montana. I hope to find more of this dinosaur in the field this week.
Over the past few years, most of what I have learned about dinosaurs has come from books and papers. I am constantly trying to keep up with the literature—both from my own edification and to bring you news of the coolest new discoveries—but there is only so much libraries can do for you. Sooner or later, you just have to get out into the field, and that’s what I am doing this week.
As you read this I am out in Montana with the New Jersey State Museum field crew to search for dinosaurs near Billings, Montana. I don’t know what we will find. Searching for fossils is a difficult process that requires a keen eye and a lot of patience, and, even when a fossil hunt is not fruitful, you can still learn a lot by reading the landscape for clues. Given that I have not had the chance to go fossil hunting very often, I don’t expect to find very much, but through my efforts I hope to learn a lot.
If you have been fossil hunting and have a cool story from the field, please share it in the comments.
(We’ll be updating the blog all week and Brian will report back from the field soon—Ed.)
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I wish you the best of luck. you’re right, the only thing you can do is to go out in the field and do it for yourself. I long to go into the field and do what you are now (but i am having problems finding just where to look). Luckily, however, the LA Museum is taking people out to Red Rock Canyon do do just that. I plan on signing up.
While not a dinosaur, i managed to locate what might be a giant sea cow in Avila Beach. Unfortunately, it’s heavily eroded and my efforts to try and get it dug out have been fruitless…
I lived in MT for six years and you’re doing something I still haven’t. Awesome, Brian – I look forward to seeing some photos…
i’ve had a few adventures in the field.
probably the most interesting was while i was looking for lost quarrys with darren tanke of the tyrrell museum around drumheller.
you can check it out on my blog here http://traumador.blogspot.com/search/label/Field%20Work-%20Drumheller
highlight posts from this multi part series include darren tanke taking me through what a lost quarry is and how to find them (http://traumador.blogspot.com/2009/01/darren-tankes-lost-quarry-project-part.html) , and the dinosaur bonebed i found (http://traumador.blogspot.com/2009/03/field-journal-3.html)
i looked at a whole bunch of stuff through out though like petrified wood, mirco fossils, ice age disconformities, and fossil poachers!
I have an interest in the history of vertebrate paleontology and several times have visited the historic dinosaur quarries out in Morrison, CO, and at Como Bluff, WY. I mainly hike around and take photographs. Every once in a while I’ve come across some bone fragments, but nothing of any significance. Once at Como I found what I believe was a small therapod footprint in a slab of sandstone just off the road near the site of Quarry #10 where William H. Reed discovered a near complete Brontosaurus in 1879. Also at Como, I located (and photographed) the exact location where the famous photo of Barnum Brown and Henry Fairfield Osborn was taken c. 1897 when they were prospecting the area for the American Museum of Natural History. They’re seen sitting next to some diplodocus bones they’d uncovered.