A long east-west ridge between Rock River and Medicine Bow, Wyoming, folded up so that three rock formations lie exposed along it, and one of the great early dinosaur hunting grounds of North America. From 1877 to 1889 men working for O. C. Marsh collected here, and the Hubbell brothers collected for E. D. Cope in 1879 and 1880, and between them they took well-preserved dinosaurs, mammals, turtles, crocodilians and fish out of the Morrison Formation at 22 separate places along the ridge, including the only known specimen of Coelurus. Early in 1878 Marsh was delighted when one of his men found a Jurassic mammal; within a year Quarry 9 had produced 250 specimens, and knowledge of the mammals that lived in the Jurassic grew enormously. The American Museum of Natural History dug here in 1897 and 1898 and found two partial sauropod skeletons. Como Bluff is a National Natural Landmark and on the National Register of Historic Places.
Jurassic dinosaurs, Coelurus and early mammals · Late Jurassic
This ground is protected. Photograph it, record it, leave it where it lies. On US federal land the Paleontological Resources Preservation Act 2009 makes collecting vertebrate fossils an offence, and penalties are real.
Other places on the map within a couple of hours.
