An Armadillo on the Prairie

Since July, Nikki has been volunteering every few Saturdays at the Plains Conservation Center in Aurora, a city/suburb southeast of Denver. She wanted to meet more people and become more active in her community, so while looking for cool volunteer opportunities in her area, she stumbled upon this place. You should TOTALLY visit their website and read all about what they do and who they are. It's pretty awesome. Also, read this article from the Denver Post to see what someone who's a little less biased thinks about the PCC. (Note, it's from 2011, so a lot's changed since then. Also note: the author incorrectly called the animals in West Bijou "buffalo." See below for why that's awful.)

The PCC (as she calls it) is a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving prairie lands, which used to be what Denver and the areas that AREN'T mountains all used to be. You know the book Little House on the Prairie? Well, it turns out that that book is really historically accurate and tells it like it is as far as what life for homesteaders was like. (In September, I'm hoping to visit the replica homestead the PCC has on their property so I can show you how cool it is!) Turns out, a lot of prairie lands have been sold to developers and turned into housing complexes (especially the lands near Buckley Air Force Base, which by the way, is where President Obama lands when he visits Colorado) or roads or cities or strip malls. This is super sad, because there are a ton of animals that call the prairie home, and if they can't live on the prairie, well...where CAN they live? It's not like anyone wants rattlesnakes staying overnight with them!

Nikki raved about this place so much that I decided to tag along one day when she was volunteering at the Visitors Center. I learned SO MUCH about the prairie that day!

This is the left side of the Visitors Center when you walk in the front door.

This is the right side of the Visitors Center when you walk in the front door.

This sign above is really cool, in my opinion. It's a timeline of the prairie and the people who made the prairie their home. One of the people who works at the PCC said that the book in the right-hand corner (The Worst Hard Time) is one of the best books to read to learn about the Dust Bowl and that whole, unfortunate time in American history.

On the day I visited, the head volunteers (Audie is in the blue. He's REALLY enthusiastic and energetic. Lee is in the orange. He's much calmer and a good balance to Audie.) were getting ready for the next day's day camp activities. The kids were going to participate in a murder mystery (!) where, at the end of the trail, they'd find a PRONGHORN SKULL AND SPINE (!!), which the staff have named "Percy." (Nikki told me she's seen it before, and her first reaction was "EW EW EW!") We were trying to get all the clue cards and journals and supplies in order before the big day.

One of the things we needed to do was use plaster of Paris to make molds for animal tracks. No one was really sure how to do it, though, so Audie and Nikki experimented a bit while Lee read directions. Their first attempt turned out really nicely...once Lee dug it out of the dried plaster with his knife!

It's a turkey foot!

Eventually, Audie figured out how to make the tracks more efficiently, so Nikki and I went back to taking pictures and talking with the visitors who stopped by to explore. So many of them lived near the PCC but had never really known it was there! So we showed them around the visitors center, gave them a map of the grounds, and gave them a calendar of summer events so they would know what cool stuff was going on.

Allow me to give you a tour!

Me in our mini replica Cheyenne teepee! I'm just hanging out with some cool, new friends who live on the prairie.

Look! I'm a pronghorn!

Fun fact about pronghorns: unlike deer, pronghorns have "horns" NOT "antlers." Pronghorns have these bony protrusions coming out of their skulls, and the horn grows on top of that. (From the website linked in the last sentence:) "Pronghorn have branched, hollow, hairlike horns that are shed annually. They are the only animal with this combination"

Creepiest. Exhibit. Ever.

The PCC is all about displaying various pieces/bodies of dead things. (*sigh* Nikki Note: They're for educational purposes, as it's much easier to learn about an animal when it's just pieces or stuffed than when it's charging at you maliciously.) They have whole collections of antlers, horns, skulls, feathers, scat (POOP!!), and fur for people to look at and play with. (You obviously don't play with the poop. Ew.)

Another dead thing at the Visitors Center. It's a hawk. Nikki wanted me to include this picture because she thinks it's really pretty. (Click on the picture to see it full-sized.)

Staring down a prairie dog

Never having lived on a prairie before, the only prairie dogs I've ever seen have been in zoos. I never realized how many could live in one area until I visited the PCC! Oh my gosh! They're everywhere! On the drive onto the property, we passed probably a hundred prairie dogs (Nikki Note: This is an exaggeration, although there ARE a lot of prairie dogs along the driveway towards the Visitors Center.), and they were all running around and "barking" at us. So weird. Learn more about prairie dogs here: Prairie Dog Coalition. MY favorite fact about prairie dogs that I learned at PCC is that their burrows are more like condominiums than holes in the ground! They have "kitchens" and "bathrooms" and "bedrooms" and "living rooms," and they keep their prairie dog condos really clean. If they ditch a room, sometimes someone else will move in.....

From top left to top right: ground squirrel, rattlesnake, prairie dog

From middle left to middle right: rabbit, mouse, black widow spider

From bottom left to bottom right: burrowing owl, salamander, hawk (which I think just eats the prairie dogs)

One of these animals does NOT live in a prairie dog burrow. Can you guess which one? ;)

The beanbags above were part of a cool game the Center had set up for kids (and parents!) to help kids learn what other kinds of animals could live in a prairie dog's home. I don't know that the younger kids really got the message, but they sure had fun throwing the beanbags!

In addition to all the dead things that the PCC has in the Visitors Center, it also has some LIVING things too! They've got a rattlesnake, a bull snake, a hognose snake (too shy for a photo), two box turtles (also too shy for a photo), and a salamander (the state amphibian!).

Lift up the flap to see the answer!

The PCC's rattlesnake has (what I think is) a funny origin story: a man came into the Visitors Center holding a shoebox with air holes poked in it and duct tape securely fastened so the lid wouldn't fall off the box. He asked an employee if they'd take in a rattlesnake. The PCC person agreed, but fairly alarmed, asked WHERE he had gotten a rattlesnake and HOW it had gotten in the shoe box! The man said that he went into his young son's room and under the bed, he found a shoe box. Opening it up...he saw the rattlesnake! How the little kid captured something that can kill you with one bite (or at least TOTALLY ruin your day) is beyond me and everyone else who works there.

 Okay, so maybe I'm just sensitive because I'm usually a prey animal in situations like this, but dude just looks EVIL. Look at those eyes! He looks like he's gonna eat me! (Nikki Note: The rattlesnake is in a secure tank and cannot eat anyone visiting the Center.)

 The rattlesnake's shed skin

Wonder who it could be?! (Other than Nikki, who is an actress.)

The bull snake!

Now, I know this isn't the greatest angle, but seriously...this dude doesn't look ANYTHING like a rattlesnake! For one, he's not evil-looking. BUT! He DOES eat hawks (well, in the wild he would), so that's pretty badass.

My favorite thing in the Visitors Center is DEFINITELY the bison head they have mounted on the right-side wall:

I know it's a "dead thing," technically, and I was all "ew, dead things" earlier, but he's so fuzzy!

One thing the PCC people are really particular about is NOT calling the bison a "buffalo." They look totally different and don't even live in the same place!! Bison are in America and Europe; buffalo are in Asia and Africa. In my humble armadillo opinion, bison are way cuter anyway. The PCC's new property on West Bijou Creek (which you can only visit during scheduled times) has its own herd of bison that will actually come up to you and feed out of your hand! I'm hoping that we get a chance to visit it soon. In the meantime, check out these photos (click "older" to see more pics) from the Denver Museum of Nature and Science of a group that got to visit the property and check out the K/T boundary. (Follow-up to the article about the K/T boundary. I'll have to ask Steve more about it, as both of the articles are old.)

Lastly, the PCC Visitors Center is home to their "Donation Sheep" where patrons who had a particularly good time can donate some cash or change to the Center to help them keep up all their awesome work.

Won't you make a donation? The sheep says she feels so empty inside...

Dinosaur Ridge

Sorry there's no witty title for this blog entry, but I think the awesomeness of Dinosaur Ridge will hold its own, no special title needed.

As you may recall, Nikki and I had driven away from Commerce City and zig-zagged down the mountain towards wherever the road took us. (There were so many bikers going up and down the mountain. I kept worrying about their safety! What if they got run over?!) Eventually, Nikki realized that rather than take us to Nederland, a tiny town in the mountains and her intended destination, the road was taking us back towards the city into Golden, Colorado. We had resigned ourselves to ending our adventure a little earlier than we had intended, when Nikki saw a sign for Dinosaur Ridge and pulled the quickest, most badass u-turn I've seen outside of a movie. As we pulled into the parking lot, I KNEW this was going to be a great time. Everywhere you looked, there were giant dinosaurs!

Here's a little bit about the location.

The first dino friend I made was the stegosaurus. He's one of the most easily recognizable dinosaurs because of his spiky tail and the spade-shaped spikes on his back. And look at his beak! Subtle proof that birds evolved from dinosaurs.

He wasn't very pleased that I was covering up his eyes for this photo!

About that "NO CLIMBING" sign...heh.

 Look how little he is compared to other dinosaurs! (More on the apatosaurus later)

After Nikki noticed that I wasn't allowed to climb on the dino statues, she wouldn't let me get on the next dinosaur, the iguanodon. (Plus, there was a family taking pictures next to the statue, and she didn't want to ruin their vacation album.)

He has a beak-like mouth too!

Wouldn't "Iguanodon" be a rockin' metal band name?!

Nikki signed us up for a guided tour of the fossil locations, but we had some time to kill, so we took some silly pictures with some...creative-looking stegosaurs near the visitors center.

I think this stegosaurus probably followed the Grateful Dead around the country on tour back in the day.

God bless America!!

After we finished goofing around, we checked out a few more signs near the visitors center to learn more about Dinosaur Ridge and "the Dinosaur Freeway."

"The Dinosaur Freeway" would be a great classic rock band name.

There's our friend the iguanodon again!

Our tour guide, TJ, is an actual paleontologist (fossil scientist) and TOTAL HEARTTHROB. And super smart, etc. He was really knowledgeable and funny and very patient with the cranky toddlers on our bus. First stop: a set of fossils that had been cut in half!

Not shown: his beautiful eyes.

The absolutely coolest, most bizarre thing about Dinosaur Ridge specifically and Colorado in general is that it used to be UNDERWATER. Well, okay, there were shallow seas and beaches, which is much different than "Colorado used to be at the bottom of an ocean," but it's still super-cool. They can tell that Colorado used to be underwater because scientists (and normal people!) have found ancient sea urchin fossils and water ripples in rocks.

The fossils seen in the picture above and the one below aren't from the same dinosaur...or even the same KIND of dinosaur! These dinos died, and their bones were washed away down river where they eventually settled. During construction on the road that runs along Dinosaur Ridge, construction workers cut this rock in half and discovered these fossils within.

Pretty sure the big one my nose is touching (yeah, I'm touching a fossil; jealous?!) is a stegosaurus leg bone. The curvy one above me is a rib bone, but I can't remember from which dinosaur. (Sorry)

Fun fact: The official state fossil of Colorado is the Stegosaurus stenops. Yes, there are such things as state fossils, and T. "Yeah I'm Sexy AND Smart" J. knew the state fossils of all of his tour group's states. Maryland's state fossil is a snail shell. (Not nearly as cool as a stegosaurus.)

Our next stop on the tour was an overhanging ridge of rocks that, at first glance, didn't seem that interesting. A bunch of orangey, wavy rocks? Pfft. Big deal. Then we learned that we were actually looking at a side view of brontosaurus footprints!

We learned that the long-neck dinosaurs known as "brontosauruses" are actually scientifically known as "apatosauruses"! TJ explained to us that different paleontologists back in the day discovered two different sets of fossils, one big with a long neck, and one small with a long neck, and named them different things. They didn't realize that they had discovered an adult and child apatosaurus until later. He also hypothesized that because The Flintstones used the term "brontosaurus" on their show, people came to know that term much better.

The red circle encloses a mama apatosaurus's footprint.

Our final stop on the tour was a part of the ridge COVERED in dinosaur footprints!

This was a part of the "Dinosaur Freeway" that we learned about above. Now, this part of the freeway was angled sharply up, but the dinos back in the day weren't climbing uphill. This land was flat, but over thousands of years, the mountains pushed these prints up onto the side of a hill. (Yes, I understand that this isn't the scientific explanation of how this happened, but cut me some slack! I'm just an armadillo! If you want to learn real science about plate tectonics and how the Rockies were formed, go to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science or visit Dinosaur Ridge!)

Probably a much more coherent explanation of these prints than I've given.

TJ climbed up the hill (which you can do, but only to a certain point so the prints aren't ALL mangled by little kids running up and down them) and pointed out some interesting prints (including one of an ancient crocodile that I couldn't get a good picture of) and telling us how these prints came to be here. The prints are from several different kinds of dinosaurs of all different ages. The kids in our tour group had a lot of fun comparing the sizes of the dinos' feet to theirs.

...I did too!

I asked TJ what kind of dinosaur made a print this big and deep, and he told me that it used to be a print like the one in the picture above, but over 50 years ago, Dinosaur Ridge wasn't as well-guarded as it is today, and someone chipped it out and STOLE IT!! Lemme repeat that because it bears repeating: SOMEONE STOLE A DINOSAUR FOOTPRINT!! He said that five decades later, someone discovered that, for all that time, the fossilized footprint had been used as a doorstop for a dorm hall at Colorado State University. A paleontology (I think) student noticed what it was, and after a few years of debating it (!), finally returned the footprint to Dinosaur Ridge. I think they donated it to a museum or something. College kids...OY.

We were heading back to the visitors' center in the "Fordasaurus," as TJ had nicknamed the shuttle bus he was driving us all around in, when he asked if there were any other questions. Nikki, who was just as infatuated with him as I was (Nikki note: I am an engaged woman and am only infatuated with Steve, my fiance.), asked TJ if HE had ever discovered anything, as he was a paleontologist. He said that he had and asked if we wanted to see his discovery. Of course we did, so he pulled over and had us all get out. I was very excited to see what awesome fossil he had found.

A rock?

TJ said that he and a friend had been walking around, turning over rocks, when he made an exciting discovery: a footprint! He said that technically he wasn't supposed to be turning over rocks, so he told his bosses that he found it that way. (If his bosses read this, please don't be mad at him!) We were having a hard time seeing the footprint because it just looked like bumps on a rock, so he pointed it out for us a little better.

Instead of the footprint being sunken into the rock like the ones on the hill, this one was raised up. (See the inside of the circle.) He was so proud of his discovery! It was really dreamy. :)

Nikki and I left that day swearing that we'd return, as we hadn't seen even half of everything there was to see. We also wanted to bring Steve, who would totally love this place. As we drove off towards home, Nikki asked me if I had had a good weekend, and I said yes. I hope she and I get to have another "mecation" soon!

Hugs & Hisses, or "Hisses & Kisses" as Nikki Kept Calling It

For Valentine's Day, the Denver Museum of Nature & Science hosted "Hugs & Hisses," an event for adults after hours that showcased their new Lizards and Snakes exhibit. They were gonna serve booze and talk about SNAKE SEX and let grown-ups walk through the exhibit without a bunch of kids running around screaming and hogging all the best space to look at the reptiles. It sounded like a GREAT TIME, so OF COURSE Nikki wasn't originally going to bring me. ;p But she tweeted to the Museum and asked if I could go, since I'm "underage." After linking to this blog to clear up who I was, whoever tweets for the Museum said that I should totally go, so Nikki brought me along. And it's a good thing she did because....I GOT RECOGNIZED BY A BLOG READER!!! OMG, it was so exciting! We were hanging out towards the end of the event, and this guy came up to Nikki and me and said that he had discovered the blog through Nikki's friend Jared's blog A Bad Case of the Dates, and could he get a picture with me because "it's not everyday I meet a celebrity." [Note from Nikki: ABCOTD is a great blog, and a lot of fun to read, but long-term following WILL cause you to lose faith in humanity. Just a warning.]
 

My fan!! His name is Terrence, and he's absolutely awesome. :)

Now, y'all may remember that I'm a big fan of snakes, especially as I have two snake sisters and a snake brother living at home with me. So I was pretty excited to be able to go to see the exhibit, as best expressed in these pictures below:

And me with my "brother" Alejandro:

(Sorry it's blurry. Steve is TERRIBLE at taking pictures.)

I was heartbroken to discover that we couldn't take pictures inside the actual exhibit. There were SO MANY photo opportunities! Like the emerald tree monitor who was named "Nikki"! Or the GIANT anaconda! Or the tank full of geckos! But alas, no photos were allowed in the exhibit. So just take my word for it: you NEED to visit this exhibit. :) However, they have a photo booth where you can get your picture taken with Bo, the giant python. Nikki and I took TWO photos in the photo booth:

The first picture is with Steve, and I'm getting "eaten" by Bo while Nikki looks on on mock horror.

The second picture is with some friends we made through the DMNS Tweet-up: Casey, Lisa, and Lauren (from left to right).

After strolling through the exhibit a few times and taking in all the lizards, snakes, and facts about reptiles, we watched a performance about all the different ways that reptiles show THA LAYDEEZ that they're ready for sexy times. The emcee asked the crowd, "Ok, I need two guys who want to impress the ladies," and Lisa called out, "Why can't *I* impress the ladies?!" Everyone laughed, and both volunteers turned out to be women: Lisa and another young lady. Their reptile foreplay action was FLEXING:

"Quick! Get a veterinarian! Those pythons are SICK!"

They then impressed the ladies by doing push-ups, which apparently, super-cute little lizards do. Lisa was in a skirt, so push-ups were a bit impractical. The other woman did the push-ups...then someone pointed out that her blouse was hanging a bit low and, ah...providing a very different kind of show for the audience.

Fun Science Fact: Reptiles do NOT have mammaries!

We ended the presentation with a conga line, presumably to demonstrate how snakes shake their rattles and get all twisty and dance-y to attract mates. Or just because making adults dance in a conga line after drinking booze is funny.

Casey and Nikki shake what the Good Lord gave 'em.

Everybody...CONNNNGAAAA!!!

Us and the emcee, who was showing off his dewlap. Rowr!!

We also attended a lecture (a.k.a. "World's Largest PowerPoint") in the Imax theatre about reptile sex. 

The scientist leading the lecture was SO AWKWARD! You could tell he wasn't used to talking about this particular topic in front of so many people. We couldn't help but giggle. And when one of his slides was a close-up of a reptile's hemipenes (male genitalia), you better believe every "adult" in that place took a picture of it and posted it to their fave social networking site! (Including Nikki)

After the lecture, we bummed around for a while and met some of the animals that the Humane Society brought in.

Casey makes a friend!

Steve contemplates fostering a python. Because why not have even more snakes?!

I have NO IDEA why there was a stuffed capybara at the reptile event. It was on a table with a bunch of other dead, taxidermied rodents and bugs. Steve says that the display was of animals that snakes eat for food. I said, "Well then, what the hell is a capybara doing there?!" Steve pointed out that an anaconda could eat one, but they don't live in the same place. So...guess it's still a mystery.

All in all, it was a great night with awesome people, cool reptiles, and an EXTENSIVE cheese buffet!