ROYAL TYRELL MUSEUM- PART 1
Hi Steemies!
As promised, I will now present you a 2 part series on the Royal Tyrell museum, a bit of the history and some of the pieces they exhibit. Many of which where found across Alberta while doing the ground work for infrastructure projects by regular worker bees like you and I.
In 1884, while prospecting for coal in the rich sediment layers of the Red Deer river valley in the town of Drumheller Ab and it's surrounding canyons, geologist Joseph Burr Tyrell stumbled across the first known dinosaur fossil of the area that sparked an unbelievable journey into discovering the past history of our land and better identifying and understanding major prehistoric events that once were a mystery. 100 years passed until the museum was built and was named after M. Tyrell in honor of his important discovery of the Albertosaurus that gave birth to the whole idea and research center.
The Royal Tyrell museum deals exclusively with paleontology research and specimen collection, identification and preservation of fossils storing a collection of over 150,000 fossils (not all on display). They offer many displays from several time periods but largely in the cretaceous period as that makes up a large percentage of the local finds. A window to the research lab offers visitors a chance to view the paleontologists hard at work studying and the restoration of the fossil collections that gets processed by the facility. On top of holding one of the world's largest collection, they also work in collaboration with research centers and museum from China, who also has a very large collection, to complete or to get castings of fossils that aren't found complete ( applicable to most larger specimens) along with fossil swaps to offer both countries with a larger display and rotation of exhibits.
Alright, I have made you wait long enough for the good stuff, here are some of my favorite pieces. Sorry if I get some of the names wrong or don't know the name because I was way too excited about the fossils that I forgot to take down the names on the plaques even tho I have been there 4 times in 10 years already. It is also fairly busy therefore had limited time with each piece to not clog up exhibits for other visitors.
Who doesn't like T-Rex!! This black beauty is one of most beautiful specimen (just my opinion) The head is so heavy that they had to make a replica of the skull to mount on the fossil and display the real skull at ground level to avoid it from falling to it's destruction. Many dinosaurs are found with their neck curled, caused as the tissue dries out pulling the long spine in that direction.
This Hadrosaur tail was found near Spirit River Ab in 2013 by a pipeline construction crew. A backhoe operator was excavating for the pipeline when he came across an unusual find.
This piece is the duck billed Hadrosaur head. I believe this skull belongs with previous picture of the tail but is displayed in a different location due to a children's dino art contest.
This sea reptile fossil is a one of a kind find. The rare element of the fossil is that it was found with the skin and external features nearly intact that generally does not preserve and fossilize, giving paleontologist a pretty clear image of what the creature may have looked like in it's glory.
This Amonite specimen is also known as Amolite due to it's unique iridescence features unique to southern Alberta, largest deposits are in the town of Lethbridge. Amolite is of such high quality that it is considered a rare gemstone, being one of the rarest gem on the earth and is treasured for the fabrication of fine jewelry( Korite is the best quality amolite mine and jewelry makers if you want to own a piece of this treasured gem).
Well friends, I have been working on this post for quite a few hours now and I need a break!!! I'm sure you can all relate. Stay tuned for part 2 in the next couple of days for my next set of pictures from the best exhibit, the grand creatures of the Dinosaur Hall exhibition of VERY large skeletons.
Good night and stay safe!