Mystery of the
Bones - Part 1

Mystery of the
Bones - Part 3

Mystery of the
Bones - Part 4

Mystery of the
Bones - Part 5

Scientific Method
Guess Log

Elena grabbed Levi up into her arms.  "Don't touch Levi, that could be something important."  She looked carefully at it.  It must be very old, she thought.  There had been a Wooly Mammoth tooth found up river from here!  Could it be from a Wooly Mammoth, or was it even older than that? 

She whooped in excitement and headed down the hill, toting Levi on her hip.  "Mom! Mom! Grandma!"  She yelled. By the time she got back to the berry patch she was all out of breath. 

Her grandmother and mother were running toward her.  "What's wrong?  Is Levi all right?  Is there a bear?  Did you get hurt?" they asked. 

"I found a bone up by the rocks!"  Elena replied. 

"You about gave us a heart attack, coming down the hill screaming like that over some old bones?" puffed Grandma.

"Very old bones Grandma, they could be dinosaur bones." 

They all went up the hill together to look.  They stood around the find puzzling over it. 

"This bone must be older than any of the peoples that ever lived around here.  Whenever we find even the oldest of the ancient fish camps the artifacts are simply buried!not embedded in stone."  Grandma said,  "Come on we'll tell the village council.  They will know what to do."

Late that evening Elena lay awake in bed thinking about the day's events. After they had talked to members of the village council, members of the council had gone up to the site. Mr. Savage had a small hand held GPS. He was able to get the exact latitude and longitude of the site and then mark it on the map. Closer examination showed two more bones and some shells buried in the rock, right there in the same spot.

Elena glanced again at the sketch she drew of one of the shell fossils. None of the elders she showed it to had ever seen another shell fish quite like it. It was almost mystical to imagine that it lived during an age of such giants.

The land where the bones were found belonged to the native corporation, so Mr. Evanoff had called the headquarters to inform them of the discovery.  They were very interested in what she reported to them and said that they would send someone out as soon as they could.  In the mean time it was important that no one touch the bone or the area around it.  The scientists that would come would be able to find out more from the rock around it.  They would also know how to carefully remove the bone and preserve it.

Elena was so curious about what kind of bone it could be that she could not stop thinking about it.  At school the teacher had shown them an Internet site about dinosaurs in Alaska.  She decided to ask the teacher if she could look at the site again and see if she could figure out what kind of dinosaur it could be.  Maybe if she looked at the maps it would tell her what kinds of dinosaurs were likely to have lived in this area.  She went to sleep dreaming of bones rising up out of the earth into glorious dinosaurs! 

Elena got up very early the next morning.  She attempted to skip breakfast and grabbed a piece of pilot bread to eat on the way.  "Where's the fire?"  Elena's mother exclaimed.  "The teacher won't even be there yet.  You'll be sitting on the steps waiting for someone to unlock the door."  
"Mom, I want to get there early enough to research the bones on the Internet.  Maybe I can find out something about them."  Elena replied.

"Just relax, sit down and eat your breakfast, you'll have plenty of time." her mom said calmly.

"Ohh, Mom!" Elena sat down and ate as quickly as she could. 

At school, she was able to find the web site quickly at the Alaska Museum of Natural History web site. Her teacher had bookmarked the site. The geologic map was of the whole state of Alaska and so was rather general. 

To figure out where the Kuskokwim River was she had to look at just the edges of the land and find what must be the Kuskokwim Bay. She made a general guess that her village was in the Mesozoic part of the map. That meant that the rocks that were on the surface around her village were probably formed during the Mesozoic Era.  "Wow!" she thought, "I knew rocks were old, but I never really thought about how these rocks right here were being made when the dinosaurs were walking around!" 

Elena looked at the list of dinosaurs that were around Alaska in the Mesozoic Era. There were quite a few possibilities. She looked for clues about finding dinosaurs and information about each dinosaur on the web site. "There is no way I can know what kind of dinosaur this is for sure. I'm going to make a wild guess now," she decided. "Then as I get more information, I can prove or disprove my theory." By looking at the size of the bones and knowing that it is probably from the Mesozoic Era, I guess that the bones are from a _________________."