Category Archives: Field Work

A day off. Now back at camp. We visited a couple of – er – parks.

And,

Saw a few bones…

Tomorrow, back to the field!

We’re in Vernal for the night. It’s time to shower and re-supply.

We didn’t actually go to the field today, so I’ll just show you some photo highlights, unrelated to the science, of the trip thus far.

There was an amazing double rainbow that night.

Last night and this morning we met a few of the – er – locals. The Scorpions.

Tomorrow we have a ‘free’ day, and will return to camp in the evening. I think we’ll visit Dinosaur National Monument and the Utah Field House.

Sounds fun!

Today involved excavation.

My student continued working to expose – and now prepare for jacketing – the marvelous soft-shell turtle she found a few days ago.

I worked on another pit looking for some big mammalian ungulates. We dug a big hole.

And, as it typical of paleontological site, just as we were about to abandon this hole as not yielding anything, we found a scrap of bone.

I know what I’ll be working on for the next few days.

It’s been a hot day.

Today’s main task was to do some color analysis to see if that can help distinguish between the Uinta Formation and the overlying Duchesne River Formation.

We also spent a bit of time surface collect for some vertebrate fossils. It was a lovely place to work.

We went back to camp a little early and set about to catalog the fossils we’ve been collecting. There are a few!

Another day in the field tomorrow!

Another great day.

We went exploring and played with a color analyzer as a potential method to distinguish between the two important vertebrate yielding units in the area.

Then it was back to the same locality we’ve been at daily thus far. We flipped the jacket we made yesterday and brought it back to camp.

As we left the field, the clouds were building…

Another promising day for tomorrow!

It was a hot one today, but fun!

We set up to do some quarrying, but the wind put an end to that quickly. Maybe where we put the shade was a little precarious.

We did make a plaster jacket today. It’s a turtle. It should be awesome.

And the day ended in a most spectacular way!

Looking forward to tomorrow!

What a marvelous day! We saw some wild ponies and a few pronghorn. I’ll post some photos eventually.

We visited an Eocene locality today and found a few turtles (like whole turtles, though munched up) and a few mammal teeth and jaws.

Maybe tomorrow I’ll remember to take a photo or two with this phone so I can share.

Here’s the one photo I took today:

This is a photo of a red layer just below the ground surface. We had wondered if the red layer was the source of the fossils. Now we think it’s modern soil-formation processes.

What do you think?

Made it into our next camping area. A little surprized we made it. Glad for four-wheel-drive.

It’s a different kind of field area. Not so much wind. Lots of pinyon pines. Orange rocks galore.

Tomorrow, we begin fieldwork in earnest. Fossils, ho!