St. George Dinosaur Discovery Site at Johnson Farm
This is a must-stop site. Although it looks unimpressive when you enter, with a little patience and the help of one of the volunteer guides, you will find that you are standing in one of the most unique sites in the world.
The building is basically a big shed that protects an extremely rare set of dinosaur tracks as well as hundreds of fossil fish, plants and rare dinosaur remains — like skin prints.
Once, during the Early Jurassic era about 195 million years ago, it was the site of a freshwater lake named Lake Dixie. It includes the largest and most well preserved dinosaur swim tracks and a fascinating set of sitting impressions that show the meat-eating dinosaur waiting for his prey, shifting, walking away and then eating it.
The temporary exhibit “Hatching the Past” the Babies of Theropods runs through August, 2009 and was featured in National Geographic Magazine.
It looks at the life of dinosaurs through their eggs, nests and embryos. The “Feathered Dinosaurs, Eggs, and Babies” portion of the exhibit is offered by the site. “The [St. George] collection is going to be the most important in the world for the researchers working on early Jurassic footprints,” said Gerard Gierlinski, Polish Geological Institute, Warsaw, Poland. 2180 East Riverside, St. George; (435)574-3466; adults $6, children 4-11 $3, under 4 Free.
The Rosenbruch Wildlife Museum
The Rosenbruch Wildlife Museum, in St. George, educates the public of the history and contribution that managed sport hunting provides for governments to provide protection for critical habitat and management of their wildlife resources. At the turn of the 19th century, hunters like Teddy Roosevelt became the first conservationists, but somewhere along the way, that link was broken into two non-intersecting sects.
But over the past couple of decades those links have been re-forged. Hunters are a common breed in Utah with a variety of big game to choose from, from bobcats to mountain lions to elk, moose, deer, buffalo and bighorn sheep. The also fish and hunt a variety of birds. What brought environmentalists and hunters together again was the growing understanding that you can’t protect a species without protecting its habitat and that there is a balance between predator, prey, water, food and migratory routes that keeps a species abundant enough to generate a hunting tag.
This museum celebrates wild animals and their habitats.
Over 300 species of animals have been collected from all over the world and are displayed within recreations of their natural habitats. Hundreds of colorful and exotic insects and butterflies are also on display and the gift shop and art gallery offer paintings, photographs and memorabilia of wildlife from around the world.
The Kids Room contains a full-size tree house, a reading nook and a variety of animal pelts that they can touch. 1835 Convention Center Drive; St. George; (435) 656-0033; adults $8, seniors $6, Children 3-12 $4, under 2 are free.
