Hall of Dinosaurs

Curation Information

Our hall of dinosaurs contains a nice variety of carnivores and herbivores.

Click here to view other information on dinosaur biology

Click here to view our Mesozoic Garden exhibit containing live plants and animals located in the museum

Click the Carnivores or Herbivores tab for more information

Click on a link below to view information and images of that particular species.

* indicates the museum has a full body mount of the species

+ indicates that the species is a new find

The dinosaurs in the pit represent the real Jurassic Park.  They are from the Cleveland-Lloyd dinosaur quarry located near Elmo, Utah approximately 25 miles south of Price.  The quarry is located in rocks from the Morrison Formation that can be found from central Colorado through Eastern Utah.  Over 10,000 bones have been recovered from the quarry and represent 11 different species of dinosaur including at least 66 different individuals.  What makes the quarry unique is that 46 of those individuals belong to the single carnivorous dinosaur Allosaurus fragilis.   The reason for this predator trap is still debated with the leading explanations being drought or botulism. 

The individuals in the pit include Allosaurus (the state vertebrate fossil of Utah), the long-neck sauropod Camarasaurus, Stegosaurus and Camptosaurus.   Allosaurus is the best known and most displayed dinosaur in the world due to the number of skeletons known, specifically from the Cleveland-Lloyd quarry.   This mount was the first one built for our museum and contains 30% actual dinosaur bone.   However, as paleontologists like to examine individual bones, the practice of mounting real bone has been very limited since that time.  Real bone may be found in all of the cases surrounding the mounts in the museum but the mounts themselves are casts made from the bones in collections.  The Camarasaurus (containing 50% real bone) and Stegosaurus (containing 10% real bone) are lying down and each bone may be removed for study.

Enjoy a birds eye view of the pit from the second floor where you will note the “death pose” of the Camarasaurus where the desiccation of neck ligaments often pull the head of a dead animal toward its back.   The living trees found in the pit are araucarian trees found today in Argentina and are closely related to monkey-puzzle trees.  These trees had living relatives in the Jurassic of North America and thus give an ecologic feel to the exhibit.

The information contained in these pages is copyrighted by the College of Eastern Utah
Last Update: 01/29/10