Excavate and preserve fossil dinosaur skeletons

Marmarth, ND - at the end of July, here, the rugged cliffs divide the border between North Dakota and Montana as if a pickaxe was plunging into the valley of hell. Volunteers defied rattlesnakes and scorpions to work in the swirling dust as if they were in prison. But they are time machines, traveling back 65 million years by excavating the rocks. And if they're lucky, they can preserve the skeletons they find.

Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History has provided a picture of the triceratops of Charles photographer R.Knight (1874-1954).The museum's painting of the three-horned dinosaur was ordered by smithsonia and completed in 1901. (Photo: LiveScience)

The cliffs here are known as a hellish abyss, one of the richest fossils in the world . The rocks have existed since the end of the dinosaurs, having been washed away eastward by the waters to the inland waters and stretching from Canada to the waters of Mexico.

After that, this land was not completely steep and canyons like today, but fertile swamps, clones, stingray teeth, petrified woods, tortoise shells everywhere; It is now proved that this area has a lot of triceratops, and duckbill dinosaurs like the dinosaur hadrosaurs of adult length of 35 feet.

Excavations of individuals

The Marmarth is an old train station of the city where the trains are only paused. The land is owned by Tyler Lyson's family, 23-year-old Yale Medical Student, founder of the non-governmental research organization Marmarth. Lyson began excavating dinosaur bones when he was 12 years old.

During an excavation from late June to mid-July, amateur and professional biologists from around the world ventured into this wilderness.

Every week, 12 or more volunteers go to Marmath to search for ancient treasures. In the daytime, they devoted themselves to finding new fossil patterns and marking important search areas with GPS detectors, or digging for fixed positions with picks and shovels to the bone. They then scraped the soil and sand thoroughly from the skeletons with a small knife and paint brush. Night time for cleaning fossil samples in the laboratory with dentist tools, small sandblasting and hammer insertion.

Use a razor carefully to remove dirt and sand
the skeleton

Many fossils have great scientific value, such as preserving dinosaur skin traces, making more research possible. Although excavations took place on personal grounds, participants were allowed to re-store fossil records as souvenirs without the need for a government and federal excavation license.

Lou Mazzella, 30, art director of art department in New York, who has undergone three excavations, brought back some parts of the triceratops. And helped to find many archaeological samples this summer in these barren lands.

Use dentist's tools to clean fossil samples

Mazzella said that 'there is nothing as exciting as discovering something for the first time, it is stimulation to find new things'.

Excavations of amateur and professional archaeologists

While professional biologist archaeologists feel excited about the passion of amateurs, a lot of concerns suggest that amateurs can influence the scientific value of fossils.

"Amateur archaeologists can accidentally damage things that are found, wrong or missing documents," said Walter joyce, an expert in the collection of ancient organisms at the Peabody National Museum of History in Yale. about specimens that have found or failed to provide scientific samples as a typical example ".

Those are affirmations, when they begin to go to Marmarth to study. Joyce said: 'All the excavations I know, they are completely inexperienced, but are dedicated to preserving the things they have found. They have sought a lot of help from professional archaeologists and that dedication has created professionalism, helping them become the basic professionals'.

Archaeologists are assembling and preserving dinosaur bones

Ngọc Lan (translated from LivScience)