![]() ![]() Because the Bighorn Basin is a dry place, not many plants grow here today, so it is easy to see the rocks. The layered rocks of the Bighorn Basin were once ancient landscapes, and the fossils in the rocks are clues to what these landscapes looked like, what the ancient vegetation was, and what kinds of animals lived here. The Big Horn Basin is located in the Rocky Mountains in northwest Wyoming The Big Horn Basin is located in the Rocky Mountains in northwest Wyoming. If you had to pick one place in the world to tell the story of Earth’s history, you would pick this place. What makes this place so amazing is that it has layers of rock from almost every single geologic time period. ![]() Because of its geology, the Bighorn Basin contains layers of rock older than 2.5 billion years, as well as many, many younger rock layers. ![]() In fact, the Bighorn Basin may be the best place on Earth to tell the story of our planet. The Bighorn Basin is a curious bit of topography, and it has one of the best geological stories on the planet. The high points of the surrounding mountains reach more than 11,000 feet, while the low point of the basin is only 3,500 feet. Buyįrom outer space or on the Wyoming Highway Map, the basin appears as a giant oval hole about 150 miles long by 80 miles wide. Merging paleontology, geology, and artistry, Ancient Wyoming illustrates scenes from the distant past and provides fascinating details on the flora and fauna of the past 300 million years. This story is an excerpt from 'Ancient Wyoming: A Dozen Lost Worlds Based on the Geology of the Bighorn Basin' by Kirk Johnson and Will Clyde ![]()
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