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By Scott Williams, June 20, 2009 5:14 pm

Old Stick of Dynamite

Its been busy, busy, busy,…so busy I have had trouble getting to my blogs.  The last week of our Jurassic Journey program ended with a bang…..literally.  Another week of finding new bones and plastering up “old” bones kept everyone moving.  In fact a couple awesome finds include a partially

Rigging the Charge

articulated sauropod tail.  These caudal vertebra are pretty huge, coupled with the other new find; a large sauropod femur (I’m betting its going to be nearly 6 feet) makes me think we might have a near-adult.  Its some kind of diplodocid…..maybe a big Apatosaurus? 

So I said the week ended in a bang…and it did.  Josh and I got a

Mission Accomplished

rare treat on Friday.  We were invited to accompany the BLM to an old Uranium mine south of the Henry Mountains.  Three sticks of forgotten dynamite were found in some mines that have not been worked for over 30 years.  So we got to help the BLM and the St. George Bomb Squad locate

Boom!

the sticks and blow them sky high.  Sometimes I think I have the best job in the world.  Now we gear up for the next week of removing bones, doing tours and having fun……at work. 

Kathleen Scordato Giving a Tour

The quarry tours are going crazy….over 200 people had taken the tour by the end of the week.  Awesome….  We had a pretty diverse crew, Bruce and Jeanette Kelly, Steve Landi, Glen Palmer were all veterans, but we had our fair share of newbies too.  I’m happy to say that Burpee Field Programs continue to be a destination for other museum institutions.  In the past we have had volunteers and staff from Field Museum, American Museum of Natural History, Indianapolis Children’s Museum, Carnegie and now we can add the Museum of World Treasures in Wichita, Kansas who send out their Director of Education.

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By Marian "Mirm" Michaelis, June 20, 2009 5:13 pm

Mirm Near the Quarry

Heidi Strand, Burpee’s Director of Resource Development & Marketing and I are fresh off the plane and have some fun photos to share. For a very quick trip, we met so many people and accomplished a lot. We made it to the Hanksville-Burpee Quarry three times in three days, not bad considering we weren’t there to get dirty.

After meeting with the BLM and some local bussiness owners, we hit the Hanksville attractions and did some shopping. Because the site was rained out in the afternoon, the whole crew headed for Goblin Valley, a near by state park. More incredible geology and scenic views. Scott

Goblin Valley

reminded us all that some scenes from Galaxy Quest were filmed here. If you’ve seen the movie, seeing these blobby rock formations might ring a bell.

Other than eating at every restarant in Hanksville, I made a point to visit the local grocery store, the Information

Mirm at Goblin Valley

Center, that doubles as a weekly clinic, the BLM office, the new fire house and all three motels.

The highlights for me were the shakes at Stan’s Burger Shack, Jed’s Jerky and everything at Blondie’s including; their great service and fun staff, the blueberry pancakes

Blondie's

Jed's Jerky

and don’t forget the turquoise jewelry.

Scott Sporting His Beef-a-Roo Tee and Estwing Cap

On our final day, we made it out to the site on the way to fly out of Grand Junction CO. I got this great shot of Scott in his Beef a Roo tee. He is convinced that Beef a Roo could rename their Olive Burger after him. Personally I would go for the Blue Cheese Burger, “Mirm’s Surprise Burger”. I know, not as descriptive, but catchy.

Ultimately, we all agreed that all of the photos just don’t do justice to the real thing. The suraoundings are so vast and colorful you start to feel “scenery drunk” from taking it all in. It reminded me of my first trip to Alaska, the scope and magesty of it all. I hope you get a chance to experience Utah for yourselves one day.

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By Marian "Mirm" Michaelis, June 20, 2009 5:13 pm

Monday, June 15 Connecting Our Future held the groundbreaking cerimony for the expansions of the Burpee and the Discovery Center

Connecting Our Future is all about the KIDS

Children’s Museum. Construction bids are being awarded to contractors and work is already beging to prepare the two orginizations for a year of change.

Dirt is Fun!

Thanks to all of you for your support of this partnership.

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By Marian "Mirm" Michaelis, June 16, 2009 1:21 pm

Lisa Johnson Getting a Tour Started

Text by Betsy Carlson, Burpee Educator

Photos by Sheila Rawlings, Director of Education, Burpee Museum

Lisa Johnson and I just concluded a week of tours at the Hanksville- Burpee Quarry with 200 visitors driving 8 miles on desert surface road to visit.  We had visitors from barely 2 years old to 85.  Today alone we had over 70.   Visitors came from eight states (the same number of states that have exposures of the Morrison Formation), Canada, and twenty-two towns /cities in Utah.  These states include Texas, Kansas, Idaho, New York, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Florida, and New Mexico.   On Wednesday all visitors were from outside of Utah. 

Having given 100s of tours in the past, this dig site tour is unique.  First, the visitors are making history.  Those viewing this quarry will be able to tell their children and grand children, “Why I was at the Hanksville-Burpee Quarry the first summer it was open to the public.  The summer they were digging out four sauropods.”  These tours are unique also in that they are continually changing.  Each day the quarries have more bones being exposed, other bones are further exposed, and still others are jacketed and removed.  So this is not static but a living tour, where visitors are experiencing science. 

The tour begins with a short introduction to the Morrison Basin and the Morrison Formation.  From there we examine the side of a preserved river channel where an Allosaurus was removed last summer.  Then we climb the ridge to look at the quarries on top.  Here a Camarasaurus and a possible Apatosaurus are being excavated. Vertebra, ribs, and scapula are quickly recognizable to the visitors. Next we leave the ridge and walk along the top of an earthen dam to look at Cow Dung Reservoir.  Then we climb down into a ravine and examine the layers of sandstone and conglomerate with different sediment sizes.  From here we walk further down into another wash where we see preserved roots, animal burrows, and Union Clams.  Now it is time to climb out up onto the opposite ridge where the Barosaurus is being dug.  This tour affords a rich opportunity to see the dig as well as to enjoy the variety of weathering formations in the Brushy Basin Member of the Morrison Formation. 

Participating in the dig is wonderful and so are the desert vistas.  But for me the best part has been meeting and visiting with the visitors on the tour.  First, I have been amazed by the geologic knowledge the Utah public has.  Basically the residents of Utah know their local geology.  I especially have enjoyed meeting families with a long history in this valley.  These visits have been truly inspirational to me.  

To relate how special these visits have been, let me relate a story.  I had given the tour to a group of twenty one.  I knew that some of the participants were from the same family.  After the tour as we were finishing the final questions, one participant said, “I think it was our grandfather who built the dam for Cow Dung Reservoir, since he was the only one in those days with a Cat” (Caterpillar crawler).  From there I learned that they had four generations on the tour celebrating the one year anniversary of one member’s heart transplant.  Another had had a hip transplant in January. The Hanksville-Burpee Quarry tour was their family outing.  Fourteen family members from 2 to 72 all descended from the builder of the dam saw his dam and the dinosaurs that lay at its foot.  Such is the history that we are learning through these tours.  I am excited by the potential which these dinosaurs hold for the future of the area of the Hanksville –Burpee Quarry.

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By Marian "Mirm" Michaelis, June 10, 2009 6:16 pm

Thank you for visiting Burpee’s Blog. If you want to read more please visit www.burpee.org Education/Expeditions you will find the links to the BLM press release and the Salt Lake Tribune article or click here for the MSNBC Story.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31124477/

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By Scott Williams, June 8, 2009 4:11 pm

Work continued in earnest this last week.  Much was accomplished and many bones were plastered and removed from the quarry.  For every bone removed it seems we find three or four more!  Particularly excited was the late in the week discovery of what appears to be a nearly articulated sauropod neck, probably a Diplodocus.  This is an important find as articulation in any quarry is a rare thing.  An articulated neck may give biological clues to Diplodocus neck posture, was it able to hold its head up like a Giraffe or could it only move its neck side to side?   We only took one day off and spent it at …..you guessed it Arches National Park in Moab.  What an awesome place.  So much cool geology there and the 1.5 mile hike to the Delicate Arch is well worth it….we caught an awesome moon rise.  

Arches National Monument & Park

Work continued on Sunday with the addition of two of our Educators, Betsy Carlson and Lisa Johnson.  We are starting a new educational program at the site, so Betsy and Lisa are there to give tours to guests who visit the quarry……today we had 25!  We received a lot of good press from the Utah Media and the Hanksville folks are really hoping that this quarry will bring some additional tourism to their fair town.  There really is a lot to see and do here in Hanksville, the Henry Mountains to the south, Goblin Valley to the north, Capitol Reef to the West and the Hanksville-Burpee Dinosaur Quarry right here…..what more do you need?

Tour