Finding Fossils: A GIS Approach to Dinosaur Hunting

Kate OheimMay 6, 2004

CE/ENVE 524

Project Setting

Two Medicine Formation, in north central Montana

Collaborator: Dave Trexler, Two Medicine Dinosaur Institute

Two Medicine Fm Background

Late Cretaceous – 73-84 Million Years old

Relatively unexplored until late 1970’s

Famous finds: Egg Mountain, first baby dinosaur bones in the U. S.

Dinosaurs - Predators

Daspletosaurus

Troodon

Bambiraptor

Unpictured: Gorgosaurus; Saurornitholestes

Dinosaurs - Lunch

Styracosaurus

Maiasaura

Lambeosaurus

GIS and Suitability Analysis

Plan of Attack Create a list of attributes to look at Gather data Process vector data to raster Decide weighting of data Calculate Experiment with weighting of calculation

Data

Ancient Geology Digital Elevation

Models Modern

Vegetation Coverage Roads Current Site Data Ownership

Data Processing

Buffer roads (half mile increments

Rasterize roads and reclassify

Rasterize geology, merge layers, reclassify

Merge DEM’s and reclassify

Reclassify vegetation

Calculation & Analysis

Add layers in raster calculator

Weighted in two different ways

Problems & Sources of Error

Problems Map corruption Spatial Analyst is very

picky Storage: File sizes are

VERY large Some data missing

such as ranch roads

Error Some data points

were gathered before acquisition of a GPS receiver

Two geologic quadrangles contain updated geology, one does not

Future Work

Run analysis using current sites for other models

Walk sections of the formation this summer in MT as a field test and for refinement

Gather more data