New Tar Pits Discovery Reminds Us The Past Wasn't Entirely Different

[Sagan]

Source: KCET

by Chris Clarke

You've almost certainly heard of the famous La Brea Tar Pits, those redundantly named fossil treasure troves in Hancock Park near the associated Page Museum. Oozing sticky tar to entomb hapless wildlife for at least 38,000 years, the tar pits have preserved a range of improbable former residents of the Los Angeles Basin ranging from sabretoothed cats to giant ground sloths to mammoths to leafcutter bees.

Wait, leafcutter bees? That's right: a paper published this week in the online scientific journal PLOS ONE describes a remarkable find of fossilized insects whose long-distant descendants may still be buzzing around your California garden.

It's a reminder that while present-day California is sadly deficient in cave bears, dire wolves, and many of the other animals that roamed its slopes during the Ice Ages, many of the Pleistocene California animals entombed in Wilshire asphaltum are still everyday sights around the Golden State.

In fact, it may surprise you that most of the fossils excavated from the tar pits belong to species that are still roaming the earth. Aside from a few of the very large mammals and one very large bird, the tar pits' bestiary would fit right in in the wild mountains north of Los Angeles: coyotes, bobcats, red-tailed hawks, and mule deer.

FULL story at link.


Read more: http://www.kcet.org/news/redefine/re...different.html

[Chantellabella]

Source: KCET

by Chris Clarke

You've almost certainly heard of the famous La Brea Tar Pits, those redundantly named fossil treasure troves in Hancock Park near the associated Page Museum. Oozing sticky tar to entomb hapless wildlife for at least 38,000 years, the tar pits have preserved a range of improbable former residents of the Los Angeles Basin ranging from sabretoothed cats to giant ground sloths to mammoths to leafcutter bees.

Wait, leafcutter bees? That's right: a paper published this week in the online scientific journal PLOS ONE describes a remarkable find of fossilized insects whose long-distant descendants may still be buzzing around your California garden.

It's a reminder that while present-day California is sadly deficient in cave bears, dire wolves, and many of the other animals that roamed its slopes during the Ice Ages, many of the Pleistocene California animals entombed in Wilshire asphaltum are still everyday sights around the Golden State.

In fact, it may surprise you that most of the fossils excavated from the tar pits belong to species that are still roaming the earth. Aside from a few of the very large mammals and one very large bird, the tar pits' bestiary would fit right in in the wild mountains north of Los Angeles: coyotes, bobcats, red-tailed hawks, and mule deer.

FULL story at link.


Read more: http://www.kcet.org/news/redefine/re...different.html

Maybe they just fell in. Is anybody watching the place at night?

sorry: couldn't resist.