Off to the field!

This week and all of next I will be out in northwestern Nebraska doing fieldwork! During the summer, the Geology Department at Augustana College (where I worked last year) offers a 3-credit course entitled "Fossil Mammals of the Badlands." This 2-week course travels to the White River Badlands of South Dakota and Nebraska to learn about the paleontology and geology of the area. The group camps on Shalimar Ranch, outside of Harrison, Nebraska, and collects fossils on privately owned land. This trip has become a tradition, with the first trip in 1982. This will be my fourth trip and we have smaller group this year than last, so that may be a good thing (shorter lines for the shower at least!). I am looking forward to getting out and doing some field work, enjoying the sun (hopefully!) and peace that comes from being in the field. Hopefully this year I will not get sick (last year I got strep throat which ate up most of my field time). You can read about last years trip here, here and here. 

After the trip I will be heading to Casper, Wyoming to attend the Second Annual Fossil Preparation and Collections Symposium. Hope to see some of you there!

Post will resume reguarly the second week of June. Thanks for reading!

© ReBecca K. Hunt-Foster

Badlands Trip Notes: Part 3

My field work fun had come to an end. I woke up with no voice and a horrible sore throat and plugged nose. I opted to stay in that day - I just felt rotten. I went inside and crashed out on one of the bunks, then went into town (Harrison - about 10 miles to the south) later that day. Soup and hot chocolat...The next morning was the beginning of the ende helped some, but the next day I was not any better and it had moved into my nose/sinuses and set up camp. So, once again, I missed another day in the field, plus the trip to Agate Fossil Beds National Monument. I had a fever and spent most of the day sleeping in the bunk house. The next day my throat was better, but my head felt miserable. This was the day the student got to take a trip to Mount Rushmore and Hill City to visit the Black Hills Institute of Geologic Research. I felt like crap on a stick but went so I could get meds and cell service so I could call the doctor to make an appointment for the day after we returned. I spent most of the day sleeping in th van, but did make it inside to see Pete Larson's cool Triceratops they are working on. Some great stuff coming from it and I can't wait to see it published! I then returned to the van for more sleeping. The next day was the last day of field work and I missed it!!! Being sick in the field sucks!!! I was none to happy about this, but I also had no energy to walk to my tent, let alone prospect. I stuck close to the bunk house, rested and read (see post on books, the best thing to come from being sick!).

The student who had found the two oreodont skulls the first day seemed to have a good eye. He found a weird skull on one of the days that I was sick (left). We think it is maybe a bear dog (Daphoenodon) or a creodont. After I got it prep'ed I am now leaning toward creodont (see below). The teeth look off to me if it were a bear dog. Would anyone out there like to venture a guess (or just tell me the answer??).






The students had to take their final exam in the bunk house this year because we were having quite a bit of rain. Every day that I missed field work it rained. All the students had studied pretty hard for the test and they did pretty well. Some students also opt to write a paper over an aspect of the White River Badlands (picked from a list we have), for more credit. This was a really good bunch of students. They were all very nice, sober (for the most part) and well behaved (especially compared to past years) and it was a nice change! I didn't feel like I was babysitting!
The next day we headed back to the real world. The wind in Nebraska was horrible, out of the southeast, and we had Yakama racks on top of the vans, so it was awful trying to keep the vans on the road (and scary at times!) Come to find out there had been straight-line winds and tornadoes the day before and we saw some of that damage. When we stopped for dinner in Des Moines we were disturbed to see that they racks had actually been moved by the wind! They had been on the right side of the van but were now in the center! Not a fun thing to discover. I was happy to be home, but it was rather bitter sweet, since I had missed so many days of field work and knew it would be my last trip as Hammer's research assistant. He and I get along really well and it has been really nice working for him.

Badlands Trip Notes: Part 2

...The next day we worked an area called the "little badlands." This area has been good to us in the past, and I have gotten a good sized turtle from here. This day I was walking around and came across alot of coyote tracks (along with plenty of cow, pronghorn and smaller tracks - probably fox. It has been really wet there recently so the tracks were pretty fresh and well preserved). Alot of them, of varying size. I had been seeing some modern bones around, but had not thought much of it, since that had been common in this area before. I came around a corner and finally realized what I was seeing - definitly more than one individual in the area, multiple taxa, and probably some juveniles of one of them. I was cursing myself for not having taken my camera out that day. The curious part of me continued to follow the tracks and I rounded a corner and saw a nice medium-sized hole in the side of an embankment. It was pretty obviously a den, many tracks coming and going from the hole (but smaller tracks, probably fox). I stayed clear of it and kept going, following the larger tracks. I got a bit away and come across what was very obviously the coyote den! It was a mess. Lots of tracks of various size going an coming, once again, and a nice leg laying in the entrance. Not attached to anything, but a loose (probably pronghorn) leg, with plenty of scat all over the area. They were not very tidy. I really steared clear of this one!! No way did I want to piss off a coyote with little ones and fresh food!! I radioed it in and kept the students away from the area. I did score a nice pronghorn skull with both dentaries (probably had at least 20% of the rest of him there, but it is always hard enough to get modern stuff home in the van as it is). I am sure this gift was complements of the coyote family.

I caught up with Paul and spent the rest of the morning prospecting with him. We were not having much luck. I found a set of articulated ribs, but the rest of its body was long gone. I told Paul about the dens and we went back so he could see. We crested a hill just in time to see a little fuzzy head outside the medium-sized den! That was really exciting and it got the curious side of Paul and I interested so we headed towards the den. We sat pretty far away from it, but close enough that we could still see the entrance. We sat very still and waited. After a few minutes we saw some movement inside and for a split second I saw a fuzzy fox face that was only there for a moment before it faded back into the dark depths of its den. It was really exciting! We thanked her for the appearance and then left her to her day and we got about with our own.

About 10 minutes before it was time to round the group up and head out I looked down on the side of a gully and found a beautiful little oreodont skull! It is by far the smallest one I had ever found and is in great condition! (left- before prep, right - after prep)

That day we spent the the afternoon letting the students study for their test they would have at the end of the trip, clean their finds and generally relax (they have it so easy!). I headed into town with the TA's and Hammer for a trip to check my email at the library in Harrison (yes, I am addicted, but I had things that needed attention) while the others gathered supplies and watered themselves at the local bar. It had been a pretty good day. Little did I know that was all about to change!


Next post...wind, rain, and no fun.

Badlands Trip Notes: Part 1

I know I have been promising to write this for a while now, but things have been pretty hectic. Tomorrow is my last day of work at Augustana College and I will be hitting the road, Colorado bound tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon. But more on that later...
I am splitting this post into a few days worth. Its too long to bore you with all at once ;) So keep checking back for "the rest of the story."

Augustana's Geology Department takes a field trip every year (for majors and non) every year to Shalimar Ranch, which is in northwestern Nebraska for a "Fossils of the Badlands" field course. The land is privately owned by an Augie alum, Bordy Munson and his family. It is White River Badlands outcrops and we mostly work the Oligocene Brule Formation, and occasionally get into the Chadron Formation. (see former post)

The first day we head to Badlands National Park, where we camp for the first night. On the way there we had one of our TA's get a flat on his car, but this was the only hangup, which was nice. Hammer (my boss) and I drive one van, while the other two TA's (Nate Smith and Paul Brinkman) drive the other. This year we had 16 undergrads along for the trip. The second day of the trip we toured Badlands, trying to dodge rain storms. Badlands has a really wonderful paleontology exhibit now in their visitor center, and I urge you to check it out if you have not seen it before.

After Badlands, we head to Wall Drug. How can you not stop in the tackiest place on earth. We let the students have an hour here (mostly to find their "tacky gift" for an annual contest we have every year to see who can find the tackiest gift at Wall Drug, under $7. There have been some interesting submissions in the past). We then eat lunch, then hit the road again. We also stop in Rapid City to visit the South Dakota School of Mines Geology Museum. These stops are all to show students other work that is/has been done in the White River Badlands and to give them a chance to see the types of fossils we will be seeing. Both Badlands and the SDSM&T museum have excellent displays for this purpose. We then stop for supplies and return to road, making the Ranch in time for dinner.

A bit of background on the ranch. Augustana has been visiting for 26 consecutive years. The ranch is a stallion ranch that also has grazing cattle and great exposures of Brule Formation! We camp on the ranch, with a great area for a big fire every night (plenty of wood too!), and a bunk house that has running water, a bathroom (with shower!), fridge, and 2 sets of bunk beds!! We are truly spoiled!

It just happened that the second day of our trip (Badlands-Wall-Rapid-Ranch) was my birthday. I was on cook crew so my group and I made burgers that night and I was eating my dinner when Hammer burst out of the bunkhouse yelling all hell-fire and pissed about something to do with the undergrads getting on his nerves. I immediately go into assistant mode and try to get the group of students that are surrounding him to disperse before he blows a gasket. The next thing I know two of our recent geology grads are singing happy birthday and bringing me a cake!! The whole thing had been a diversion so they could get it ready!! Sneaky, but a very nice surprise. By that point I had forgotten it was my birthday!

The next day was our first day of field work. We headed out to a valley we call "Mesohippus Valley" (after the first fossil ever found there) and introduce the students to prospecting and set them loose. It was great to get out and stretch my legs and enjoy the sun and outcrops. I found plenty of loose dentaires, coprolites, and limb bones. I also found a Archaeotherium tusk and one oreodont skull, but it was pretty beat up. The students were all excited to be cut loose and seemed to be doing pretty well. One kid found two oreodont skulls before lunch! After lunch we prospected another small set of badlands, which I always think of as the turtle graveyard, since that is what I most often find. Giant turtles (ok, its a tortise, I know...Stlemys nebrascensis typically), plastron up, often missing the plastron all together. They look like prehistoric salad bowls!

The next day we headed to another set of badlands further back on the ranch and prospected that area. All I found were alot of holes. A certain "commercial" group pays a fee to prospect on the ranch and they often work this area. Last year I found a nice "pocket turtle" (a turtle that is small enough to fit in your pocket, not sure what taxon he is, he's not cleaned yet, sad to say), but this year all I found was 'turtle bits' and the occasional coprolite.

Near lunch time I started to hear bangs. At first it sounded like someone throwing rocks at something metal, but then I realized they were what I did not want them to be - gun shots! I called Hammer on the walky-talky and we did not have any trouble gathering the kids up, since they were mostly already at the meeting spot for lunch. We ate and continued to listen, then on the far ridge I spotted two atv's heading in our general direction (as well as you can out there). By this time lunch was over and the students were heading back out. Hammer and Nate went in the atv's general direction to see what was up. Long story short - we had to get out of there, and fast!! The story includes a large dog and two cowboys with guns, and it is destined to include a bobcat and bear in the story by the time it becomes legend with the student body. I started hollering at the students to gather them up. They, of course, were very confused, but all complied and moved fast to get back to our meeting spot. Within five minutes we had them all gathered (I was impressed!) and we headed back to the vans. We went and worked some sections between the vans and where we had been for the rest of the day, but the area was sparse and the students were beat after their second day outside in the sun. Most of these kids are not use to being outside hiking in the sun, so we try to not kill any of them. :)

Next post...modern mammals and a nice find!

Off to the Badlands I go

This week and all of next I will be out in northwestern Nebraska doing fieldwork! During the summer, the Geology Department at Augustana College (where I currently work as a Paleontology Research Assistant - for a few more weeks at least) offers a 3-credit course entitled "Fossil Mammals of the Badlands." This 2-week course travels to the White River Badlands of South Dakota and Nebraska to learn about the paleontology and geology of the area. The group camps on Shalimar Ranch, outside of Harrison, Nebraska, and collects fossils on privately owned land. This trip has become a tradition, with the first trip in 1982. This will be my third trip and we have quite a big group this year. I am looking forward to getting out and doing some field work, enjoying the sun (hopefully!) and peace that comes from being in the field. Its always a good way to transition into summer and get my blood flowing again after the long winter. I am looking forward to the camp fires and dusty days of hiking.

This is the beginning of my my gypsy stage. I am moving out of my apartment in the morning, Kelty will be staying in Rock Island while I am in Nebraska, and when I return (the 6th) I will work my last week at Augustana (living out of the car) before heading to Colorado on the 12th! I will be living in western Colorado for good now, no going back to Rock Island. Its going to be a busy few weeks! Hope all of you have a good few weeks. I'll be sure to post some nice field pictures for you all when I get back, but for now you will have to enjoy these from past years ;)