The Friends of the Florissant Fossil Beds, Inc.

The ancestors of these modern marine diatoms coexisted with the dinosaurs. Photo Credit: Dr. Neil Sullivan, University of Southern California/NOAA
University of Colorado at Boulder graduate student Mary Ellen Benson, M.S., gave a talk about her doctoral research at the University of Colorado Museum of Natural History (UCM) on February 7.
Benson’s talk, titled “Exceptional Diversity of […]

Read former Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument intern J.J. Huie’s full article in the Spring 2008 Friends newsletter!

With Deep Roots in Colorado: The Ponderosa Pine
by J.J. Huie
I like running in Colorado when the sound of my breathing is drowned out by a wind so violent it causes the arms of the ponderosa pines (Pinus ponderosa) […]

It’s hard to forget the eerie sound of an American bull elk bugling–the sound is almost completely unlike a bugle, but rather a high, unearthly wail. Elk bugling is a common sound at Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument in the fall, when elk rut (seek mates).
American elk (Cervus canadensis*), which once numbered 10 million in […]

Join rangers at Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument to learn about, listen for, and hopefully see wapiti (American elk). The eerie bugling of elk in rut is a common sound at the park during the fall mating season, and you are sure to see signs of elk like scat and chewed bark on aspens. […]

Park staff, particularly Student Conservation Association interpretive intern Lindsey Stecker (Boston University) and Chief Ranger Rick Wilson, have been working hard to control the spread of sweetclover this summer.