Inside The Worlds Most Unusual Fossil Site - The La Brea Tar Pits

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

It's a 40 minute video but it's so informative.

Two history YouTubers; Milo 'Miniminuteman' Rossi, an environmental scientist, archaeologist, and science educator, and Lindsay Nikole, a zoologist, go behind the scenes at the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, seeing how the site treats the fossils recovered from the crude oil from the tar pits, how they're stored, along with a brief showing of the near three MILLION fossils recovered from the site during its over century long history of excavation at the site, which includes the likes of Columbian mammoths, dire-wolves, short-faced bears, giant ground sloths, sabre-toothed cats, ancient horses and bison, and a lot more.

Now, I know not a whole lot about how fossils are formed in the La Brea Tar pits, but the way they form in the tar and asphalt is so different to just regular fossilization wherein the bones turn to stone, because these are as close to actual bones as people can get. There's still protein in the bones! And it's not just the bones themselves that are of scientific interest, but the asphalt that the bones are found in are of interest as well, as we see in the video where, once a bone is denuded of the asphaltic matrix, the matrix is kept and then basically gone through with a fine tooth comb to find stuff within like insects, shell, flora and even just sand itself, so as to better investigate the conditions of prehistoric Los Angeles.

 

[Hans Blaster]

It's a 40 minute video but it's so informative.

Two history YouTubers; Milo 'Miniminuteman' Rossi, an environmental scientist, archaeologist, and science educator, and Lindsay Nikole, a zoologist, go behind the scenes at the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, seeing how the site treats the fossils recovered from the crude oil from the tar pits, how they're stored, along with a brief showing of the near three MILLION fossils recovered from the site during its over century long history of excavation at the site, which includes the likes of Columbian mammoths, dire-wolves, short-faced bears, giant ground sloths, sabre-toothed cats, ancient horses and bison, and a lot more.

Now, I know not a whole lot about how fossils are formed in the La Brea Tar pits, but the way they form in the tar and asphalt is so different to just regular fossilization wherein the bones turn to stone, because these are as close to actual bones as people can get. There's still protein in the bones! And it's not just the bones themselves that are of scientific interest, but the asphalt that the bones are found in are of interest as well, as we see in the video where, once a bone is denuded of the asphaltic matrix, the matrix is kept and then basically gone through with a fine tooth comb to find stuff within like insects, shell, flora and even just sand itself, so as to better investigate the conditions of prehistoric Los Angeles.

I'll have to watch the video later. It is a fascinating place to visit.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

I'll have to watch the video later. It is a fascinating place to visit.

Especially since there's some good behind the scenes looks at the storage of the bones and how they prepare them too. Well worth a watch for sure.

 

[Chesterton]

I visited that place. It's awful. It's the pits.

 

[AV1611VET]

It's a 40 minute video but it's so informative.

Interesting.

And from Wikipedia:

La Brea Tar Pits comprise an active paleontological research site in urban Los Angeles. Hancock Park was formed around a group of tar pits where natural asphalt (also called asphaltum, bitumen, or pitch; brea in Spanish) has seeped up from the ground for tens of thousands of years.

But I'll still go with Noah living in what is now New Jersey before the Flood.

New Jersey Pine Barrens

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

Interesting.

And from Wikipedia:

La Brea Tar Pits comprise an active paleontological research site in urban Los Angeles. Hancock Park was formed around a group of tar pits where natural asphalt (also called asphaltum, bitumen, or pitch; brea in Spanish) has seeped up from the ground for tens of thousands of years.

But I'll still go with Noah living in what is now New Jersey before the Flood.

New Jersey Pine Barrens

Did you watch the video?

 

[AV1611VET]

Did you watch the video?

Negative.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

Negative.

Then either please watch the video or keep your peace.

 

[AV1611VET]

Then either please watch the video or keep your peace.

Then I'll keep my peace.

Sorry -- I'm not going to watch a 40 minute video.

 

[Ophiolite]

Then I'll keep my peace.

Sorry -- I'm not going to watch a 40 minute video

Then please do @Warden_of_the_Storm the courtesy of not polluting his thread with uninformed comments.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, this Wikipedia article contains a list of half a dozen other global tar pits.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

Then I'll keep my peace.

Sorry -- I'm not going to watch a 40 minute video.

Why not?

 

[AV1611VET]

Then please do @Warden_of_the_Storm the courtesy of not polluting his thread with uninformed comments.

Does that include the Wikipedia article I posted as well?

Meanwhile, back in the real world, this Wikipedia article contains a list of half a dozen other global tar pits.

Please do Warden the courtesy of not polluting his thread with uninformed comments.

 

[AV1611VET]

Why not?

Probably for the same reason you won't read the Wikipedia article I posted.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

Does that include the Wikipedia article I posted as well?

The Wikipedia article wasn't a problem. It was your standard extra-Biblical commentary about your views on New Jersey pines and pitch. That was off-topic.

Please do Warden the courtesy of not polluting his thread with uninformed comments.

Except he's making a commentary on something pertinent and connected to the OP. Yours was not.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

Probably for the same reason you won't read the Wikipedia article I posted.

That's a nonsensical comment right there since I did read the Wikipedia paragraph.