Oregon's Rich Fossil Record

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A Little More about Oregon's Fossil Record from the Condon Museum Website: Oregon is exceptionally rich in fossils of many types and ages. This fact is emphasized dramatically by the designation of the John Day Fossil Beds National Monument in the area where Thomas Condon spent so much time and effort. Fossils of marine mammals, which are among the best in the world, are found in the coastal rocks of Oregon. (We'll hear more about these from this month's speaker, Dr. William Orr.) Collections of fossil plants that record the environments of the past are found in many places in the state. Invertebrate fossils are common along the coast, as well as at hundreds of localities in the Coast Range. The remains of Pleistocene bison, camels, horses, mammoths, and giant ground sloths are not uncommon in the Willamette Valley. The Condon Museum houses a "Superbly preserved thirty-thousand-year-old Pleistocene (Ice Age) bison, recovered from a prehistoric swamp near Tualatin. The skull measures four feet across the horn crests." And a "Beautifully preserved 20 inch-long carapace and skull of the 44 million year old Eocene seat turtle Eochelone from the Coaledo Formation at Coos Bay is a close relative of the modern marine green turtle Chelonia." What breadth and depth fossils give to our knowledge base.

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