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Castle Valley Vol. No. 2 |
Utah
Friends of Paleontology P. O. Box 5984 CEU Campus Price, Utah 84501 |
Byron Ray : President Duane Taylor: Pres. Elect Carol Michael: Secretary Rodger Crowe: Treasurer Barbara Warren: Historian |
AND: Many willing volunteers who help make this chapter the greatest by arranging for speakers, field trips, bringing refreshments to meetings and, in general, keeping the organization going.
Contents
(Click
one for more information)
| Dues Time Again 1 | Web Site Anyone? 2 |
| Help Needed at Bone Lab 1 | Study Examines Fat, Hungry Dinos 2 |
| Put February Meeting on Your Calendar 2 |
You are probably aware that the Chapter dues are now on an annual January first through December thirty first basis. Members joining during the middle or latter part of the year were assessed partial dues to cover only part of the year with the full dues being due in January of 1999. While you have this Newsletter in your hand, won't you find your check book and send a check to cover the cost of your 1999 dues to the chapter treasurer, Roger Crowe. Dues can be sent to Roger at: PO Box 5984 CEU Campus, Price, Utah 84501.
Dues should be sent in the amount of:
FAMILY MEMBERSHIP $20INDIVIDUAL MEMBERSHIP $15
STUDENT MEMBERSHIP $10
Please send your dues with the enclosed dues payment form. Thank you!
Why do we due you???? Part of the dues go to the state organization for the state convention, donations to museums and digs. The portion we keep goes toward our local expenses. Supplies and equipment for the museum and bone lab, newsletter expenses and all those little bills we need to pay to keep the organization going. Your dues are needed and appreciated.
Now that we have finished up 1998 (except for taxes and a few other projects), we are looking forward to a new year filled with challenges and opportunities. Although the next few months will not be conducive to a lot of outdoor digging, there are still many bones in the lab that need to be prepared, and hopefully, everyone will be able to put a little work in preparing some of the bones that were excavated last year.
If you have some time to spend in the lab, John Bird announces that the lab will be open on Wednesday evenings. Any UFOP members are invited to come to the lab from 7:00 to 9:00 PM to help in preparing bones. It would be helpful to John if you could call him at the lab (637-2021 Ext. 5645) or leave a message for him at the CEU Museum (637-5060). Let him know that you are coming and how long you plan to stay. John says that if you want to start as early as 6:00 PM, he will try to accommodate you.
This is one job where you do not need experience. Just show up and someone will be there to help get you started and show you what to do. This is a great way to spend a couple of hours with some old fossils and even work on some bones.
Remember that to obtain your first or second level of certification that you need to have hours working in the lab.
Put February Meeting on Your Calendar
Our February meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, February 9. This month our meeting will be held at the bone lab. For those of you who have been there, you know what to expect. If you have not yet experienced the lab, there will be plenty of help there to get you started. There is always plenty of work going on at the lab and there are still many bones that need to be prepared from our digs last summer.
This meeting will be at the regular time . . . 7:00p.m. We hope to see all of you there. If you haven't seen the back room, and the Huntington Mammoth bones maybe we can convince John to give a tour!!!!
There has been some discussion about setting up a UFOP website. In order to do this we would appreciate any ideas or suggestions from the chapter regarding what you would like to see on the site. We will have access to some people who can help develop a great site, but we need your ideas.
Perhaps some of you have sites, or have seen sites that had things we might want to include in our UFOP site.
There are numerous links that we would also like to include in our site and have our site linked to. If you are aware or any links we might want to include, please let us know. There is a Paleo Ring that has a lot of great sites and links and we will include that in our own site and be linked with many other paleontology sites..
Any and all ideas will be welcomed. E-mail them to Byron at bnray@afnetinc.com or send them via snail mail to the UFOP PO box. We look forward to hearing your ideas.
Pre-history Week and Predators to People
Last year the state wide Pre- History Week and the local Predators to People celebration were held at the same time. This proved to be a big success, but the weather was a bit chilly (read: snowy and rainy) for many of the outdoor activities.
There were about 5000 people involved in the local activities. Many of them; from Carbon and Emery counties, and also a good number from other areas of the state.
This year the planning committee has met and plans are underway for this years events. The decision was made to separate the two events. The Pre-History week will be held the end of April and first of May. Predators to People has been scheduled for June 4 - 12 to take advantage of warmer weather.
As plans progress we will need volunteers to help with these events. Next month we will have more news about these events. Put these dates on your calendar now so you will be available to participate.
Also, watch upcoming issues of SUNSET magazine for information about the local area. They are planning to write an article about local events.
Scipionyx in the News Again!
We had an article a few months ago regarding this amazing find in Italy in which a fossil skeleton was found with many of the internal organs preserved. The following article recently appeared in the newspaper.
Study examines fast, hungry dinos
"You wouldn't want to meet a theropod (meat-eating dinosaur) in a dark alley," says Cherly Dybas of the National Science Foundation.
She was commenting on an Oregon State University study funded by the foundation, in which scientists examined the world's best-preserved fossil of a theropod. The baby Scipionyx dinosaur was discovered in Italy a few years ago. The creature lived about 110 million years ago. It was preserved with remnants of its liver, large intestine, windpipe and even muscles. Paleontologists discovered that the species was fast and dangerous.
But these dinosaurs were not as much like birds as people have speculated. "They lacked bird-style lungs or other anatomical features suggestive of a sustained high metabolic rate", said Zoe Eppley of the NSF.
"This find adds further support to the view that these dinosaurs were not warm blooded."
