HAGERMAN FOSSIL BEDS NATIONAL MONUMENT TOSSfflL W«)

MARCH, 1993 VOLUME 2, NUMBER 1

THE "BARE BONES" the study presents conceptual OF THIS ISSUE plans for two of those sites on the Hagerman side of the Snake River. Planners determined that -Documents for Pubiic Review locating permanent facilities on the Monument side of the River -Doctor in the House is unacceptable because of unstable soils and poor access. -Volunteers On-Board A consultant's report, funded -Improvements and Tours cooperatively with the Idaho Department of Commerce's -The Wagons Are Coming South Central Travel Committee, Region IV, -MONUMENTAL SCIENCE -Research evaluates the anticipated use of -"Critter Corner" such a Center. It provides a profile of "typical" visitors and their expectations. It also TWO PLANNING evaluates the existing com­ DOCUMENTS FOR munity infrastructure and traffic PUBLIC REVIEW AND circulation options. The results of the study will be used by COMMENT- The National local and state agencies to plan Park Service has scheduled for the best way to provide for a March release of its Site identified community and visitor Selection Plan and Environ­ needs in the future. mental Analysis (E.A.) for the proposed Paleontological If you received this newsletter Research Center/Museum in by mail, you will also be sent Hagerman. Fourteen potential the Site Selection Plan and E.A. locations were evaluated, and

HAGERMAN FOSSIL BEDS NATIONAL MONUMENT • 221 NORTH STATE STREET • P.O. BOX 570 • HAGERMAN, IDAHO 83332 • PHONE (208) 837-4793 Both planning documents are here in the fossil beds for available for review at most the Idaho Museum of Natural libraries in southern Idaho or at History. Greg also assembled the N.P.S. office in Hagerman the "horse" skeleton cast in the across from the High School Hagerman Valley Historical along Highway 30. Society Museum. Following graduation from ISU, Greg went Meetings for the public to to the University of Florida for provide comments and input on his Masters and from there to the proposed Paleontological the University of Toronto where Research Center/Museum will he earned his Ph.D. Between be scheduled during the week the degrees, Greg spent a year starting April 19, and specific as a museum intern in locations and times will be vertebrate paleontology at the announced in news releases. Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh. Input is welcome by mail as Prior to taking the position at well. If you have any Cincinnati, Dr. McDonald questions, please phone 208) returned to Idaho and again 837-4793. worked at the Idaho Museum of Natural History, this time as the PALEONTOLOGIST Collections Manager in NOW ON STAFF - vertebrate paleontology. The Yes, Hagerman Fossil Beds National Park Service is very National Monument now has pleased to draw to Hagerman a paleontologist of his caliber. one - a paleontologist. What kind of "...ologist"? A paleontologist is a scientist who Dr. McDonald has already explores for, and examines, planned facilities in the existing fossil remains of ancient life to office space for fossil determine their life form and preservation treatment and history. Dr. Greg McDonald storage under controlled comes to Hagerman from the conditions for maximum Cincinnati Museum of Natural preservation. He is also History, where he was Curator preparing for the upcoming field of Vertebrate Paleontology. season when he will attempt to Although new to the National relocate and record the known Park Service, Greg is no fossil sites on the Monument. stranger to the Hagerman area. Greg will present issues in this He did his Idaho State and future newsletters. University undergraduate work expand into the building next TWO ACTIVE door. Sometime this summer VIPs"- Hugh and Diane exhibits will provide visitors Harper are veteran "Volunteers with general information on the In Parks" (VIPs) who are history of the fossil beds, their actively contributing nearly importance, and some full-time services to the interesting things about fossils. Monument. Hugh is retired Limited but regularly scheduled from the Bureau of Land hours of operation will better Management and the Idaho serve the public. Department of Fish and Wildlife. Diane is retired from OREGON TRAIL teaching elementary school and SESQUICENTENNIAL- applies her skills in a variety of A sesqui-what?! It's the projects. They have moved to 150th anniversary of the Hagerman from Boise, and say Oregon Trail. A wagon train they'll be here to help "unless it which will start at the eastern gets too cold." Idaho border will be travelling as closely as possible to the IMPROVEMENTS ARE original route this summer. The COMING! - The first wagons will be authentic - no improvement for visitors on the rubber tires! One of the Monument itself has been wagons has been sponsored funded and is in the design by the National Park Service. process. This Fall, a platform On July 1 6 the wagon train will overlook will be built that be camped in the National provides a panoramic view of Monument, and an evening the Hagerman Valley, the Snake interpretive program will be River, and the bluffs of the presented. More information Monument. Several self-guided will follow in the next issue of exhibits for the overlook and the "Fossil Record". the Bell Rapids Boat Dock area are also underway. It should provide an informative and scenic stop for visitors.

Changes are also planned for the N.P.S. office in Hagerman. Negotiations are underway to MORE TOURS EXPANDED FORMAT- PROPOSED - staff is Starting with this newsletter, gearing up to provide more various scientific topics will be tours of the Monument this covered in a section separate upcoming summer. The type from the general issues of activities will be announced regarding the Monument. in the next newsletter.

River Otter herd, what time of year did MONUMENTAL they die? For example, a large SCIENCE number of young colts might suggest the event took place in the spring. By comparing the FOSSILS: WHAT'S Smithsonian specimens with AHEAD? - With more than what we know about herd 200 scientific papers already structure of modern zebras and written about the different wild horses, we may gain some fossil species at Hagerman insight into the ecology of this fossil beds, a reaction to a extinct species. discussion of future research might be "What else is there to Throughout the Monument do?" These papers are merely there are numerous the foundation for the needed concentrations of small research - the tip of the vertebrate fossils. Although proverbial iceberg. collection has been conducted by many institutions, no one For example, the extraordinary has yet investigated the sample of zebra-like horses relationship of these fossil from the famous Smithsonian concentrations to the layers of Quarry has been examined and sediments. Do these measured by many scientists concentrations only occur in of fossil horses, yet no one has certain types of sediments? done a "population study" of Are they only found at a these specimens. How many particular elevation? Are only males and females were certain species of animals represented and what age found at these sites, and was classes? Trends have shifted the site an unusual one in the in paleontology from studying environment? These are some individual specimens to of the many different types of "populations" of fossil animals, questions that the research and the environment in which program at Hagerman Fossil they lived and died. Was the Beds National Monument will Hagerman deposit of "horses" investigate. As the research a single catastrophic event that program progresses, even more buried a single herd or did the questions will appear to large number of individuals challenge paleontologists and accumulate over a long period geologists. As the song goes, of time? If it was a single "We've only just begun." RESOURCE that the flows were at their MANAGEMENT- peak levels from January through March. In April the Evaluation is continuing on the flow started to drop and landslide problems in the levelled out in May and Monument. A group of remained consistent through scientists, representatives of August. This is interesting the Bell Rapids Irrigation because the pumps are usually Company and the National Park turned on in April of each year. Service (N.P.S.) met to discuss By September, the flow was what is presently known about back to the same high rates as the water flow problems. A the first three months. What pian resulted which outlined the this indicates is that there is a next possible steps. five month lag-time for the water to seep from the unlined The Bell Rapids Irrigation canal until it flows out on the Company suggested that the slopes. rates of seepage from the canal and ponds be evaluated as the The analysis of aerial pumping stopped. They photographs showed that the installed gauges and blocked 1991 landslide involved about the remaining water in several canal segments. The loss from ten acres and almost three the lined portion of the canal million cubic feet of material. was about .03 feet per day, An area north of this landslide while the unlined portion lost previously slid downhill and over one foot per day. involved about one and a half Scientists are further evaluating million cubic feet. The two the data. The N.P.S. expressed areas have surface cracks their appreciation of the connecting them from the company's involvement, and resulting unstable conditions Manager Rick Kruse for his and additional movement is initiative and timeliness in the anticipated. The area remains study. unstable, dangerous, and closed to all public access. As a result of the late October, 1991, landslide the N.P.S. had measurements taken of the water flowing from the seeps during 1992. The U.S. Geologic Survey data reveals CRITTER CORNER- individual are taken into consideration. This problem is By Dr. Greg McDonald, simplified here by the large Monument Paleontologist number of individuals recovered at the Hagerman Horse Quarry. This is the first of a series of articles describing some of the Despite the popular use of the many animals that have been name, Hagerman Horse, it is found as fossils at Hagerman actually more closely related to Fossil Beds National Monument. the zebras. Although we don't Because attention was first have fossil evidence of stripes, drawn to the Hagerman area by the pattern of the chewing the Smithsonian Institution's surfaces of the teeth and excavation of the Hagerman details of the skull and rest of Horse Quarry, it seems the skeleton indicate that this appropriate to start this series animal was more closely related with a discussion of the famous to the living Grevy's Zebra of Hagerman "Horse", Equus Africa than to horses. So the simplicidens. next time you're at the zoo, take a good look at the zebras What makes the Hagerman on display and you'll have an Horse_so important? First, the opportunity to see a close discovery from Hagerman is the relative of one of the earliest largest sample of this extinct residents of the Hagerman area. species from one locality. Over two hundred individuals of Many different scientific names both sexes and all ages were have been applied to this horse. recovered by the Smithsonian. James W. Gidley, the Included are complete skeletons Smithsonian paleontologist, as well as skulls, jaws and who led the initial excavations detached bones. They were at Hagerman in 1929, felt that about the size of the present- the horse being uncovered was day Arabian horse, and had a different enough in its skeleton single toe (hoof). Vertebrate that it represented a new paleontologists must often species distinct from any other work with single, isolated known fossil horse. He bones or teeth. So it is often proposed the name Plesippus difficult to assign them to an shoshonensis. By placing the Hagerman horse in the genus already described species when Plesippus. he considered it to differences in sex or age of an be closely related to another The Hagerman Horse also has fossil species, Plesippus the distinction of being the simplicidens, from Texas. earliest record of Equus. the Although another horse, Equus genus that includes all modern idahoensis. had been described horses, donkeys, and zebras. from elsewhere in this region, Dr. Gidley considered his new Even though the species found species to be more primitive. at Hagerman, Equus Since the early work of Gidley, simplicidens. is known from many other studies on fossil elsewhere such as Nebraska, horses have been made and the Florida, and Texas, all of the consensus is that the horse at other records are much Hagerman does belong in the younger, making the sample modern genus Equus and that it from Hagerman the oldest. is the same as the extinct species from Texas, simplicidens. So today most paleontologists refer to the Hagerman Horse by the scientific name of Equus simplicidens.

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