Dinosaur Journey in Grand Junction, Colorado

Dinosaur bones are found all over the world, and they’re found in specific formations. What’s a formation? It’s a geologic layer of material such as sandstone, mudstone or silt that geologists and paleontologists use to identify the age and even the kind of climate and landscapes that existed when the formation was created. For example, in Western Colorado, dinosaur bones are found in the Morrison Formation. The Morrison Formation is made up of greenish- and reddish-colored shales and was deposited when this area was a large basin. Dinosaurs just loved to hang out around here because there were lots of rivers and trees - and that’s why there are so many bones just waiting to be dug up!


It wasn’t until just a few years ago that paleontologists discovered that some dinosaurs actually built nests for their eggs. We still don’t know if dinosaurs actually took care of the babies once they were hatched.	Many scientists believe that a huge meteor impact helped cause the extinction of the dinosaurs about 65 million years ago. But it wasn’t the actual impact that caused their deaths – it was the resultant climate change from all of the dust and debris that got kicked up into the atmosphere. That meant the sun’s rays couldn’t get through so the earth got colder, plants died – and so did many of the dinosaurs. And don’t forget – most of the dinosaurs were very large and that meant they needed a lot of food!	On the Isle of Wight, off the coast of South England, rocks are yielding fossils from the early Cretaceous period -- spanning from 100 million to 140 million years ago -- which are rarely found elsewhere. The island is a window on the Cretaceous world which doesn't occur anywhere else in the world. The island is important not only in historical terms, but also because new dinosaurs continue to be discovered there and are well-preserved and articulated -- that is, their bones are joined together." A previously unknown cat-like, flesh-eating dinosaur was discovered in a crumbling cliff by an amateur fossil collector. And in 1997, another previously unknown dinosaur, Neovenator salerii, a smaller version of Tyrannosaurus rex, was found on the island.