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| 1) The crew begins to remove overburden above the point where Mike Baldwin first found two plesiosaur vertebrae. A working area somewhat larger than the expected extent of the fossil must be cleared to within a few inches of the bone level to provide a space for several people to begin working with small tools. |
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| 2) The crew continues to prepare the site while discoverer Mike Baldwin examines yet another find...a fish eroding out of the roadcut below the plesiosaur level. The wide, gentle slope of the roadcut provides excellent opportunities to find fossils in an area with few natural rock exposures. |
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| 3) Shane Tucker (Highway Salvage Preparator), Mike and Jane Voorhies and Angie Paquette continue to remove overburden. A nice working quarry floor is about ready for the careful work of finding out if the fossil actually continues back into the hill. Sometimes, after the heavy work of removing overburden, we find that the original discovery (perhaps a bone or two) is all that there is! |
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| 4) Not this time! Bruce Bailey (Highway Salvage Paleontologist) and Shane have located the vertebral column stretching back into the bank. The small yellow flags (extending from the green tarp to the back wall between Bruce and Shane) mark where bone has been discovered. Only enough rock is removed to show the extent of the fossil. Removing too much matrix at this time endangers the specimen. |
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| 5) The task at this point is to remove rock from areas where there is no bone. The end result is to isolate blocks of rock containing the skeleton on pedestals. Later the pedestals will be jacketed with plaster and burlap strips so they can be safely removed from the ground and transported back to the museum. |
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Photojournal page 1 | 2 | 3
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