Research Updates

2012 Snowmass Picking for Small Vertebrates

The dates are now set for picking snowmass sediments for small vertebrates, vegetation, and shells. During November the group found more than 50 salamander vertebrae and limb bones plus a few jaws. The hilights were two vertebrae from a garter snake and an isolated tooth of a heteromyid rodent and a fragment of a tooth of Peromyscus. Additional specimens of mammals included a tiny ulna and scapula more...

Stegomastodon Site Yields Nice Fossils

August 19th 2011. This second week of excavation at the Stegomastodon site has now concluded. The team was successful in field jacketing much of the axial skeleton of the big gomphothere on Thursday. The entire team worked tirelessly and by 6-7 pm the specimen was hoisted up some 15 feet in the air using two nylon towing straps hooked onto the bucket of a backhoe craftily maneuvered by Don Marr. Don more...

Stegomastodon Site update

More bones have been discovered since our return yesterday to the Stegomastodon site on Tuesday afternoon. New specimens of a lower jaw and some other bones have been discovered. Also a new tooth of a fossil gopher - both specimens found by Mike Lacey. The crew has been great with Dena Meade-Hunter, Mark Hunter, Gloria Carbaugh, Mike and Liz Lacey, Dalton Meyer, Emily Hoefs, Jim Cornette, Charles Nelson more...

Stegomastodon Excavation Continues

The Stegomastodon site near Holyoke, Colorado, continues to produce more fossils. The capped all six of the jackets extracted and with the help of Ranchers Randy and Renee Weis, they were loaded onto a utility trailer to be transported back to the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. In total, there are now five different animals represented. The Stegomastodon specimens now include several tusks more...

Wind River Eocene Trip Cancellation

The field trip to the Wind River Basin, Wyoming, has been cancelled for 2011. This is due to the recent discoveries in Eastern Colorado at the Weis Gravel Pit site in eastern Colorado Near Holyoke. See news update on Facebook under " Fossil Posse" and the next Research update at Eocene Mammals. There will be multiple opportunities to work in both the Bridger Formation and Wind River Formation more...

Awesome new Stego-Mastodon site

Today, we began excavating at the Stegomastodon site near Holyoke Colorado. One skull is still being uncovered and we began excavating a short string of five vertebrae. By the end of the day, the string expanded to about a dozen and a half articulated vertebrae plus some ribs and limb bones. The specimen has turned out to be very well preserved and a potentially spectacular specimen for the DMNS collections more...

Exploration in Western Colorado

August 3 to 6, preliminary explorations were made in the Debeque Formation (Paleocene-Eocene) and the Green River Formation (Eocene) near Rifle and Debeque. Although no absolutely spectacular specimens were discovered, the ground work was laid for developing a collaborative project between the Denver Museum of Nature & Science and schools in the Roaring Fork Valley and western Colorado. The discoveries more...

Volunteer Help Needed to Pick and Sort Snowmass Screenwash Samples

All Earth Science Volunteers at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science are invited to a preliminary meeting on Thursday August 25 at 4:30 in the Big Bone Room to set up a program of picking and screen washing of sediments from the Snowmastodon site that many people excavated this summer. There are more than 300 bags of sediment that need to be screen washed all of which need to be picked for small more...

Volunteers Needed for Field Work in the Wind River Basin

Volunteers are needed for an upcoming field trip to collect fossils in the Wind River Basin that will take place from the morning of August 15 to August 21. This field trip will involve both excavation and survey for fossil vertebrates of Eocene age as well as some basic stratigraphic work. We will be camped at the Buck Spring Site located about 60 miles west of Casper, Wyoming. Send an email to Richard more...

Summer of Elephants and the Pleistocene, 2011

This summer has been the "summer of elephants" or more directly proboscideans. In October of 2010, a new spectacular site named the Snowmastodon site was discovered by heavy equipment operators during the excavation for enlarging a pond at high elevation near Snowmass Village, Colorado. The site has been extremely productive with more than 5,000 bones and bone fragments of Pleistocene megafauna more...

Research Updates