Canyon Lake Gorge

Acrocanthosaurus

This Friday we took a school field trip to Canyon Lake Gorge. I have to say some of the views were just beautiful. The canyon exposes rocks that are over 100 million yeas old. It contains several dinosaur tracks and millions of year old fossils scattered all over the place. On our way trough the gorge we saw two dinasour foot prints. We saw an Acrocanthosaurus, a large theropod dinosaur, walked in two legs and were carnivorous.They could weight over two to three tons and could grow over 41ft long. The other foot print we saw was a camarasaurus, large four legend dinosaur that feed on plants and often swallowed rocks to help them digest and break down plants. They weight over 20 tons and could grow up to 59ft long.

Not only can you see dinosaur prints you can also find hundreds of different fossils that have been there for millions of years. Scientists from all over the world come visit canyon lake gorge to see different rock formations and the millions of year old layers of the earths crust that the canyon has exposed. The canyon exposes faults, bends, and it exposes soil that was formed millions of years ago. Canyon lake gorge is a great and beautiful and fun place for anyone to vise enjoy it, have fun, and learn about the earths history while doing it.

The Earth is heating up and we have to stop it

My quarterly project this semester is about global warming. So what is global warming? Well global warming is the slowly raise in the average overall temperature of the earth. As the temperature in the atmosphere and oceans increase the earth starts going trough a serious of domino effects that are hazardous to humans and animals. We as humans have an enormous affect in the creation and speeding up of global warming. How global warming works is trough the greenhouse effect. As the heat from the sun enters the atmosphere it is reflected by the earths surface and what doesn't get trapped in the atmosphere or in the oceans is released back into space. But as our earth gets filled with more green house gasses like CO2, CH4, N20 and other gasses more heat gets trapped in the atmosphere and less heat is released back into space.
Around the world we can see how just a few degrees higher the earth is starting to go trough some dramatic changes. We can see places that are normally dry becoming even more dryer. In some places the temperature has made it to where our crops are failing. Also there has been a series of record breaking storms. Our whether has started to become more erratic. Since the earth is getting hotter the ice in the polar caps are melting and sea levels are rising. We see more floods and a decrease in the population of marine animals that are essential the the earths ecosystem.  

Three Research Projects that made me Think

First and foremost the giant shark now when you talk about sharks this one is for sure the scariest that's ever lived. Then there's the snowy white place they call "The cotton castle" its almost like being in heaven from what I heard ans saw in the pictures. Its defectively a place you'll want to visit when you get a chance. And last but not least the most important and informational presentation for me was the minerals presentation. Who knew minerals are responsible for so much of our daily life. With out them there would be no us.

The sharks name was Megalodon. They got the "maga" part right it was definitely a giant. It was over 20 meters long. It lived approximately around 1.5 million years ago. It got its name from its teeth. Megalodon means "giant tooth". Megalodons fossils have been found all over the world. The two main types of fossils found are tooth and vertebrates. It eat large fish, whales and other sharks of the time period. Its closest living relative is the great white shark.Scientist don't relly know why they went extinct but there are 3 main theories why -competition with one another, the environment, and food shortage.

 The cotton castle is made up of travertine which is a type of limestone.It is made up of several hot and cold water springs containing hydro-carbonate precipitation. The water springs cool when tectonic plates move and expose the carbon dioxide.Volcanic activity under the surface heats the springs.Besides here travertine can be found in Turkey and Italy. The cotton castle very beneficial to the people that live in Pamukkale because is creates jobs and improves the economy of the people in Pamukkale. It has became a world heritage site and and great place for scientific research to be conducted.

The earth contains thousands of minerals.Aminerals is a naturally occurring substance that is solid, inorganic, and representabl by a chemical formula. Some examples of minerals are Gold, Tellurium, Cadmium, Aluminum, corundum and many more.Gold is nontoxic, malleable and durable. Tellurium is a semi conductor and is used in film for solar panels.Cadmium is an extremely toxic type of mineral in all forms -solid, liquid, gas.Aluminum mainly derives from Bauxite Ore. 25 percent of aluminum can be found in bottling and canning industries. Corundum is rated 9 in the Mohs scale. It is the second strongest right behind diamonds. There are six characteristics for future applications of minerals in our world. They have to be nonosize, of high purity, customizable properties, low weight, recyclable, and harmfulness.

Titanoboa: The Amasonian Monster

The bone on the right is the back bone of a large boa constrictor

The bone on the left is the back bone of the Titanoboa.

Titanoboa

In 2009 Scientist found the back bone of a large snake in the Carrejon, Northern Amazon, in a coal operation site. Scientist determined the bone belonged to a large reptile that was part of the boidae family and lived around the middle Paleocene era around 60 million years ago. They called it Titanoboa.Its name is a combination of "Titanic" because of its size and "Boa" because of its close relation to Boa snakes.
The closest living relative to the Titanoboa today is the boa constrictor. Just like the boa constrictor the Titanoboa squishes and suffocated its prey to death and then it would swallow its prey whole. The Titanoboa was about 49 feet long, weighed about 2,500 pounds and could apply about 400 pounds of pressure per square inch . In other terms it is like being squished by the weight of three Eiffel towers. Just like all snakes Titanoboa had a quadrate bone that gave it free horizontal and vertical movement of its lower two piece jaws. The jaws were connected by an elastic ligament that moved independently and allowed it to eat lager prey several times its head size.

When the Titanoboa lived in the Amazon the climate was different than it is today. The environment back then was hotter and more humid and filled with large swampy jungles.Today the Amazon receives about 80 inches of rain but during the Paleocene time period the Amazon receives over 150 inches of rain per year. It was an area filled with deep rivers and large forest plants and trees.