Dinosaur Ridge Dinosaur Ridge is a hogback west of Denver, between the towns of Morrison and Golden, that beautiful exposes dinosaur-bearing rocks of Jurassic and Cretaceous age. Dinosaur Ridge is a spine of sedimentary rock about 3.5 miles long. Both bones and tracks of a variety of animals from the Age of Dinosaurs are visible. Dinosaur Ridge area is one of the world's most famous dinosaur fossil localities. Starting in 1877, many of the first and best skeletons of Stegosaurus, Apatosaurus, Diplodocus, Allosaurus and other dinosaur were excavated in 150-year-old rocks of the Morrison Formation on the west side of the ridge. The ensuing "bone crush" spead up and down the Front Range and throughout the central Rockies in the Morrison Formation.Dinosaur Ridge is the locality of the Morrison Formation. To geologists the Morrison Formation says "dinosaurs". A great surge of dinosaur dicovery took place as fossil hunters explores the Morrison everywhere it crops out-in Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, Utah and beyond. the original speciment of Apatosaurus came from here.The first Stegosaurus was found here (and is now Colorado's state fossil. It consists of mudstones, limestone and sandstone that accumulated near the edge of the vast inland sea that used to cover the Midwest during Mesozoic time. In the 1930s, during the construction of West Alameda Parkway, dinosaur tracks were discovered on the east side of Dinosaur Ridge in the 100-year-old rocks of the Dakota Group, representing the Cretaceous Period. The tracks are those of Iguanodon-like plant-eating-or herbivorous-dinosaur and ostrick-sized meat-eating or canivorous-dinosaurs. Recent research has revealed that these tracks represent only a small part of the extensive track-bearing beds that can be traced along the Colorado Front Range. Because this strata represents the shoreline sediments of and acient seaway that was frequently trampled by dinosaurs, these beds have been callled the "Dinosaur Freeway"
Dinosaur Ridge
ReplyDeleteDinosaur Ridge is a hogback west of Denver, between the towns of Morrison and Golden, that beautiful exposes dinosaur-bearing rocks of Jurassic and Cretaceous age. Dinosaur Ridge is a spine of sedimentary rock about 3.5 miles long. Both bones and tracks of a variety of animals from the Age of Dinosaurs are visible. Dinosaur Ridge area is one of the world's most famous dinosaur fossil localities.
Starting in 1877, many of the first and best skeletons of Stegosaurus, Apatosaurus, Diplodocus, Allosaurus and other dinosaur were excavated in 150-year-old rocks of the Morrison Formation on the west side of the ridge. The ensuing "bone crush" spead up and down the Front Range and throughout the central Rockies in the Morrison Formation.Dinosaur Ridge is the locality of the Morrison Formation.
To geologists the Morrison Formation says "dinosaurs". A great surge of dinosaur dicovery took place as fossil hunters explores the Morrison everywhere it crops out-in Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, Utah and beyond. the original speciment of Apatosaurus came from here.The first Stegosaurus was found here (and is now Colorado's state fossil. It consists of mudstones, limestone and sandstone that accumulated near the edge of the vast inland sea that used to cover the Midwest during Mesozoic time.
In the 1930s, during the construction of West Alameda Parkway, dinosaur tracks were discovered on the east side of Dinosaur Ridge in the 100-year-old rocks of the Dakota Group, representing the Cretaceous Period. The tracks are those of Iguanodon-like plant-eating-or herbivorous-dinosaur and ostrick-sized meat-eating or canivorous-dinosaurs. Recent research has revealed that these tracks represent only a small part of the extensive track-bearing beds that can be traced along the Colorado Front Range. Because this strata represents the shoreline sediments of and acient seaway that was frequently trampled by dinosaurs, these beds have been callled the "Dinosaur Freeway"