Fossil Birds of Wyoming

J. P. Cavigelli, The Tate Geological Museum

Wyoming is well known for its fossils of all kinds. Dinosaurs are probably the most famous. They were first discovered here in the late 1800’s and are still being uncovered and studied nowadays. Fossil fishes from the southwest corner of the state are mined by the thousands and sold in rock shops all over the world. Wyoming also has great deposits of fossil mammals, and reptiles such as crocodiles and turtles. But what about birds? In general, bird fossils are generally very uncommon. This is mainly due to the fragile nature of bird bones; birds tend to decompose before they get a chance to become fossils. Bird fossils are generally found in deposits that are intensively collected. Despite their rarity, many bird fossils have been found in Wyoming, including some of the best in the world. Let’s go birdwatching in ancient
Wyoming!

               JP Cavigelli was born back east in the summertime, of Swiss immigrant parents (from the type Jurassic area).  He is prep lab manager and field trip organizer and collections manager at that Tate Geological Museum at Casper College.  As a biology major at the University of Chicago, JP became interested in paleontology, although way too late to get a degree in it.  This led him to a summer spent in Wyoming (mostly in the Big Horn Basin) in 1983 doing field work in search of small Cretaceous mammal teeth with a University of Wyoming team.  JP fell in love with Wyoming but left for a five year adventure in fun and poverty as a ski bum and whitewater rafting guide in Colorado and Australia.  JP came back to Wyoming in 1990 to be part of a paleontology field crew at the UW again.  He lived in Laramie working off and on in paleontology for 14 years, doing field work as well as a two year post as the Collections Manager for the UW's Dept. of Geology and Geophysics.  He also was a fossil outfitter, running Western Paleo Safaris for six years.  For the past 25 or so years, JP has been doing freelance fossil preparation in his personal prep lab.  He has had the good fortune of having been invited to join international paleontological expeditions to Niger, Mongolia, Tanzania, Alaska and North Dakota.  In his 19 years at the Tate Museum he has led collecting trips all over the state to collect small and large fossils from Dee the Mammoth and Lee Rex to microscopic mammal teeth and really old insects and ichthyosaurs.  When he is not involved with fossils JP enjoys birdwatching, traveling, and hanging out with his supercalifragilisticexpialidocious wife (they were married on a dinosaur skeleton).