Dig This (or, Them Bones)

Loretta Lynn went Dinosaur Digging

(view more by Loretta Lynn at ww.fit-4-sports.net)

Science is organized knowledge. Wisdom is organized life.

-Immanuel Kant, philosopher (1724-1804)

It takes an experienced eye to look at loose dirt and quickly ascertain what is
rock and what is bone. Just ask paleontologist Jerry Jacene of Red Feather Fossil
Excavations, Glendive, Montana.
“This is hands on history,” explains Jacene. A field director with more than 20
years in paleontology, Jacene has traveled, excavated and documented historical
finds in Tennessee, Wyoming, Montana and China, just to name a few places.
A dirt, rocky road will take you back, literally, 12 miles to Makoshika Breaks
(aka Camp Rex) and back in time to when cretaceous mammals roamed the Badlands of
Montana when it was oceanfront property. Makoshika is fifty square miles of buttes
(sandstone), rolling prairies, a few pine trees, and is also a working ranch.
When our group first met Jerry, he showed us several fossils (bones, teeth, eggs
and claws) he collected just for our benefit. The first “clue” he explained to us
was that bone is porous, so if you lick it, it should stick to your tongue.
This area, known as the Badlands, used to look like the Everglades, according to
Jerry, resident paleontologist.
Our camp consisted of a few cabins, a large tepee, and a modern single-story
building which housed the kitchen, dining room and gathering place, with two
bathrooms and two showers. In an emergency there was always the outhouse,
(handicap accessible, but not the buttes). It was here that co-owner Lois prepared
1,500 meals in one day for television crews and ranchers when the Discovery
Channel came out to make a documentary about the History of Tyrannosaurus Rex (T-
Rex).
The rustic cabins are bunk style and minimal electricity. You wont need an alarm
clock because daybreak comes around 4 am, and it doesn’t get dark until around 10
pm. In case you forgot yours, there are sample packs of Advil and lip balm,
compliments of the owners, in the cabins and in the restrooms.
In addition to daily digs, visitors can learn about branding, round-ups (even
participate in their twice yearly event) and horseback ride. Approximately 500
head of cattle are on the property and 100 horses, most of them wild. Evenings are
best enjoyed sitting around the campfire sharing cowboy stories and singing
familiar songs.
Our dig begins the next morning after a quick breakfast, buffet style. We load up
on Jerry’s pick up truck to cover some ground faster. We pass through several
barbed wire fences, which have to be opened and closed by hand to prevent cattle
from roaming too far. During the summer some cows will find their way into the
buttes, along dangerous dry, remote areas where they are prey for coyotes and
other wild animals. Donning hats, sunscreen and carrying bottled water, we make
our way through cathedral buttes, and rock formations holding treasures of
history. Amateurs and volunteers (students to adults) play a major role in
discovering, digging and cleaning dinosaur bones and other fossils.

“The most interesting and historical finds are not the big ones, like T-Rex or
Triceratops,” said Jacene. “It’s the small finds that are the most significant.
The trace fossils tell us so much more, like the environment, what they ate; the
ecosystem. And how they interacted with each other.”
Trace fossils – footprints, mineralized feces, stomach stones-gastroliths, and
impressions left by skin or feathers.
In North Dakota tracks, similar to that of an alligator, possibly 90’ in length
have been found. They are ripple marks, 2 1’2” apart and tracks from a rigid tail,
1 ¼” apart. According to Jerry, no one has seen anything like this. They don’t
know what kind of animal it is.
The most common finds in this area right now are turtle shells. These are easily
detected because of the pattern on the shells, this tells us there must have been
water nearby. You can also find small mammals in ant hills. Ants move the earth,
putting sand and dirt on top of the bones, helping preserve them.
Jerry knows the terrain in the immediate area better than nearby roads. As we hike
he points out where certain bones have been found and how.
“With a pair of 10x50 binoculars, I was able to see a (large) piece of bone
protruding from a rock formation,” said Jerry. He points out the various layers,
bands in the buttes. “You want to look in the dark bands,” he further explained.
The layers are ironstone and bentanite. Larger bones that may be protruding are
due to the erosion from weather.
The excavation of one butte has brought out an arctic crocodile and a mammal bone,
possibly a leg bone from a Chasmosaurus. And in another layer, Lemur teeth have
been found. Oftentimes, in order to move fragile bones and preventing any further
destruction, fossils are encased in a plaster jacket to preserve and relocate
them.
About 16 miles away from camp is a new excavation site with the possible skull and
bones of Triceratops coming out of a butte.
Inside these buttes are remains from Hadrosaurs, Chasmosaurus, and raptors.
Jerry, like all other paleontologists and students, carry a tool kit with them and
a journal for taking their field notes. In this journal they will write down the
location, sometimes drawings a grid, as well as the bones themselves. Depending on
where fossils are found, top, middle or lower portion of rock formations, can also
help determine whether or not other bones may still be there to excavate, and if
there may have been water there and other dinosaurs, or a nesting area.
Bones found near the bottom usually mean most of the body of a dinosaur is not
still there. These are fragments that have been eroded from the rocks and buttes
over thousands, millions of years.
While hiking through dry creeks, down rocky terrain, and up steep rock formations,
we occasionally stop to look at fragments of turtle, and other dinosaurs from the
cretaceous period. Jerry points out where T-Rex was found, and a hadrosaurus, and
a bone that would be good practice for students to work on gridding, based on how
it’s resting in the dirt and the deterioration. Sometimes he will have students
map the bone, by the area, and then rebuild it back at the lab or in a classroom.
Students, parents, kids of all ages can come out to look, learn, possibly earn a
badge and take home part of history.
Many of the bones from this area have been shipped to museums around the country.
Local residents, businesses and paleontologists are working to keep recent, new
and future findings in Montana.
Jerry is also very active in helping shape the Makoshika Dinosaur Museum in
Glendive. At the museum parents, kids and visitors can see, touch and learn
dinosaurs through hands-on exhibits and displays. Currently under construction,
the first (lower level) floor will showcase a Dino Walk, showing through models
and exhibits the Triassic through the Cretaceous periods. A real working lab is
located on the main level where student technicians and Jerry will work on
restorations of both real and model bones for exhibit. The third floor will offer
hands-on exhibits for kids and adults. All exhibits are not static or museum like.
These exhibits use real bones, and the dioramas depict natural habitats of
dinosaurs and their prey as best as they can based on actual findings. On display
is a life-size Velociraptor, which was found in Mongolia. One wall is encased with
actual bones, no model or clay replicas are housed in this section.
Both the museum and ranch are on the Dinosaur Trail which consists of about a
dozen ‘actual” dinosaur sites in and around Montana, North Dakota and Utah.

There have been five great extinctions in the world and very few animals or
mammals are still living today. In order to survive in the animal kingdom, it must
be kept simple. They must be able to adapt in order to survive. The deer, coyote
and fox are going to survive, whereas, a koala bear will not. When diet changes,
so does the size of animals. According to Jerry, some paleontologists believe that
man is the one destroying our own land, and we are speeding up our extinction.