Dateline: October 10, 2002

Scientists tour local fossil quarry sites

By Roger Estlack, Clarendon Enterprise

More than 30 paleontologists from across the country visited fossil beds in Donley County Monday as part of the 62nd Annual Meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.

The tour was part of a three-day field trip hosted by West Texas A&M University before the society’s annual meeting in Norman, Okla., later this week.

Dr. Gerald Schultz, WTAMU professor of geology, and Dr. Jeff Indeck, curator of archeology at the Panhandle Plains Historical Museum, led the trip.

The group’s first stop was the MacAdams Quarry in the northeastern section of the county. The site, which was last excavated in 1959-60, was one of the richest in terms of the number and variety of fossils recovered.

Bob Emery, one of the scientists present at the 1959 dig, told the group that the MacAdams site yielded a dozen different species of three-toed horses, all of which existed at about the same time. 

“This was a very special place in the evolution of the horse,” Emery said. “It represents an explosion in development.”

Dr. Xiaoming Wang, a noted authority on prehistoric dogs, discussed the variety of carnivores present which probably used the small horses for lunch. There were small- and medium-sized dogs found at the MacAdams site, but there were also some huge beasts – bone-crushing dogs – present at the same time.

“These were some of the largest dogs ever to have evolved,” Wang said. “Some had long legs and were the size of bears.”

The group also toured fossil sites on Turkey Creek and on the old RO Ranch during their visit Monday. They also visited locations in Palo Duro Canyon and Lipscomb County this week.

Donley County and Clarendon in particular are famous in the world of paleontology for the fossils that were recovered from this area. In the 1940s, a geologic period of time – the Clarendonian Land Mammal Age – was named in honor of Clarendon, Texas, because the largest amount of fossils typical for that period came from Donley County.

The paleontologists visiting this week represented such respected institutions as the University of Florida, the University of California-Berkley, and the Smithsonian Institution; and each of them were well acquainted with the Clarendonian Age.

The Clarendonian Age was between nine to 12 million years ago during the Tertiary Period of the Cenozoic Era, Schultz said. It was followed by the Hemphillian Age (named for fossils found near Miami, Texas) and the Blancan Age (named for Blanco Canyon near Floydada).

Schultz said the Clarendonian is known for such prehistoric mammals as three-toed horses, giraffe-necked camels, and short-legged rhinos. Mastodons and saber-tooth cats have also been found in Donley County.

For more information about the field trip, contact Schultz at 806/651-2580, 806/467-0498  or gschultz@mail.wtamu.edu.