Uncovering the Past
In the ground in north Arlington, UT Arlington researchers are uncovering the past.
The Arlington Archosaur Site has yielded a number of ancient fossils since excavations began there in 2003. Among the finding are a 95 million-year-old crocodile bone, a new lungfish, bones from a possible new carnivorous dinosaur species, and a fossil that may be Protohadros, a missing link in the dinosaur world.
UT Arlington doctoral candidate Derek Main is taking full advantage of the opportunity it presents. "The big picture is that it's not just another dinosaur site," he says. "It's a Cretaceous coastal ecosystem," a snapshot of an ancient environment and its creatures.
That makes it both rare and important, notes Main's professor, Christopher Scotese of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Department. "The site is significant because it has a diverse fauna of reptiles and also abundant plant material, and the rock and the geology tell us quickly what kind of environment they lived in."
The 2,200-acre swath of grassy, treed prairie was part of a flat shelf in an ancient ocean between 119 million and 95 million years ago, explains Southern Methodist University's Louis Jacobs in his book Lone Star Dinosaurs. As Main puts it, "Arlington was the Galveston or the Mississippi Delta of the Cretaceous." More than half of Texas was under water.
A big claim to fame for the Arlington dinosaurs and crocodiles is their place in ancient history. The Mid-Cretaceous Period came before T. rex and Triceratops, which lived near the end of the Cretaceous. That puts the local dinos in a position to tell the world more about an era that's been short on clues.
"The Mid-Cretaceous is not particularly well known," says David Weishampel, a prominent researcher at the Center for Functional Anatomy and Evolution at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. "[Main is] adding more and more to the information we have."
The Arlington site is part of the Woodbine Formation, fossil-laden rock that extends under Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport and toward East Texas. "People forget what they live on," Main says.
While a final repository for the fossils hasn't been decided, everyone agrees that the site is important for UT Arlington as an educational tool. Main's face lights up when asked about it.
"To go on a dinosaur dig, it's something people only dream about," he says. "I think this stands out as a much more powerful teaching tool" than sitting in a classroom.
College of Science Dean Pamela Jansma agrees. College students, she says, "don't usually have things like this in their backyard. If you read about dinosaur discoveries or important paleontological breakthroughs, most of the time they're in China, Mongolia, Africa. They're far away. It is a rare opportunity, especially in such a metropolitan area."
Main looks forward to more significant findings.
"There's so much left to learn," he says. "The Arlington Archosaur Site project has certainly captured the public's attention and imagination. Why not continue and build on that success?"
"There's so much left to learn. The Arlington Archosaur Site project has certainly captured the public's attention and imagination. Why not continue and build on that success?"
