Oldest known dino fossil in Denver Basin recently found beneath city’s Museum of Nature & Science parking lot
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Drilling project in Museum of Nature & Science parking lot leads to ‘exceptionally rare’ fossil find
The Denver Museum of Nature & Science began a geothermal test drilling project in its parking lot in January. Scientists were eager to take up the rare opportunity to learn what was below the surface there. That led to quite the surprise 763 feet under the ground of the museum’s parking lot. The bone belonged to a plant-eating dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous about 67.5 million years ago, similar to a Thescelosaurus or Edmontosaurus. Those creatures lived in modern day-Denver just ahead of the asteroid strike that killed off the dinosaurs, the museum said.. It has now been named the deepest and oldest dinosaur fossil ever found within Denver city limits. The fossil is on display at the museum within the “Discovering Teen Rex’ exhibition, which displays an adolescent T. rex fossil that was discovered by teens in North Dakota. The find was “basically like winning the lottery and getting struck by lightning on the same day,” said Dr. James Hagadorn, curator of geology.
In January, the Denver Museum of Nature & Science began a geothermal test drilling project in its parking lot to assess the possibility of using geothermal energy to cool the museum and moving away from natural gas. With a giant, narrow drill going about 1,000 feet deep into the ground, local scientists were eager to take up the rare opportunity to learn what was below the surface there.
Those staff carried out a “scientific coring research initiative” to better help researchers understand the geology of the Denver Basin, the museum said.
Rick Wicker Earth Sciences Curator Dr. James Hagadorn and Research Associate Dr. Bob Raynolds examine scientific cores in the parking lot at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science in January 2025. (Photo/ Rick Wicker)
That led to quite the surprise 763 feet under the ground of the museum’s parking lot in City Park — a 70-million-year-old partial dinosaur fossil.
“That this fossil turned up here, in City Park, is nothing short of magical,” said Earth Sciences Research Associate Dr. Bob Raynolds, who has worked at the museum for 35 years.
Rick Wicker A portion of the dinosaur bone was recovered from a scientific core — drilled 763 feet below the surface of the Denver Museum of Nature & Science’s parking lot in City Park. (Photo/Rick Wicker)
According to a recent article in the scientific journal “Rocky Mountain Geology,” the core that was removed by the drill was relatively small, so “it is remarkable that a dinosaur fossil was encountered.”
“This is a scientifically and historically thrilling find for both the museum and the larger Denver community,” said Dr. James Hagadorn, curator of geology at the museum. “This fossil comes from an era just before the mass extinction that wiped out the dinosaurs, and it offers a rare window into the ecosystem that once existed right beneath modern-day Denver.”
He added that this find was “basically like winning the lottery and getting struck by lightning on the same day.”
Wicker; Richard M./Denver Museum of Nature and Science Researchers at Denver Museum of Nature and Science looking at ornithopod vertebra from the Denver Formation. Left to Right: S. Augusta Maccracken; David Krause; Patrick O’Connor.
Dr. Patrick O’Connor, director of Earth & Space Sciences at the Museum, helped the team to identify the bone as a vertebral centrum belonging to an plant-eating dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous about 67.5 million years ago, similar to a Thescelosaurus or Edmontosaurus. Those creatures lived in modern day-Denver just ahead of the asteroid strike that killed off the dinosaurs.
It has now been named the deepest and oldest dinosaur fossil ever found within Denver city limits, the museum said.
Andrey Atuchin, Denver Museum of Nature & Science Image of a plant-eating ornithopod dinosaur, Thescelosaurus, during the latest Cretaceous Period, nearly 67 million years ago. These around 10-12 foot long two-legged animals roamed the tropical swamps, forests and floodplains where Denver now stands. Their vertebrae are similar to the one found in the rock core deep below the Museum. (Photo/Andrey Atuchin, Denver Museum of Nature & Science)
The fossil is on display at the museum within the “Discovering Teen Rex” exhibition, which displays an adolescent T. rex fossil that was discovered by teens in North Dakota.
“This may be the most unusual dinosaur discovery I have ever been a part of,” O’Connor added. “Not only is it exceptionally rare to find any fossil as part of a drilling project, but the discovery provided an outstanding collaborative opportunity for the museum earth sciences team to produce an article led by Denver Museum of Nature & Science postdoctoral scholar Dr. Holger Petermann.”
That article by Petermann was published in the scientific journal “Rocky Mountain Geology.”
The fossil was found within the Denver Formation — or D1 Sequence — which is a rock layer within the Denver Basin, where non-ornithopod ornithischian dinosaurs have been discovered, including Triceratops, Pachycephalosaurus, Triceratops, Torosaurus, and a nodosaur. However ornithopod fossils, as the one found earlier this year appears to be, “are comparatively rare,” the article reads.
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“This fossil underscores the highly fossiliferous nature of the entire D1 Sequence (Denver Formation) and increases the diversity of dinosaurs known from the Denver metropolitan area,” the scientific article reads.
The D1 Sequence area is “rich” with fossils and discoveries date back to more than a century ago with Arthur Lakes, a professor out of Golden, “filling wheelbarrows full of bones along the Front Range to be shipped to colleagues on the East Coast,” the article continues. Lakes is responsible for identifying many of the fossils along the Dakota Hogback in Morrison, which is now called Dinosaur Ridge. He also found a Tyrannosaurus rex tooth on South Table Mountain in 1874 and discovered the first dinosaur footprints in the state near Colorado Springs in 1902, according to the Dinosaur Ridge visitors center.
‘Nothing short of magical’: Dinosaur fossil discovered deep below Colorado museum
The fossil was found beneath the parking lot of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. It was found 763 feet beneath the ground, encased in rock dated to 67.5 million years ago. The vertebra is believed to have belonged to a plant-eater of that Late Cretaceous period. The fossil “offers a rare window into the ecosystem that once existed right beneath modern-day Denver,” curator of geology James Hagadorn says. “Urban paleontological discoveries are rare but often ignite public interest in science and deepen our connection to nature,” researchers wrote in the scientific journal Rocky Mountain Geology.”This may be the most unusual dinosaur discovery I have ever been a part of,” said Patrick O’Connor, the museum’s director of Earth and Space Sciences. “Discovering Teen Rex” exhibit is now on display at the museum in City Park, near Coors Field.
Fortunately, this dinosaur fossil in Denver was found at a workplace of well-trained eyes.
As Denver Museum of Nature and Science’s Bob Raynolds said in an announcement: “That this fossil turned up here, in City Park, is nothing short of magical.”
The fossil was uncovered beneath the parking lot on the north side of the museum, as explained in an article in the scientific journal Rocky Mountain Geology.
In January, as the museum oversaw deep drilling to explore a transition from natural gas to geothermal energy, resident researchers saw a coinciding opportunity for innovative, scientific coring to explore the geologic depths of the Denver Basin.
“In my 35 years at the museum, we’ve never had an opportunity quite like this — to study the deep geologic layers beneath our feet with such precision,” Raynolds, a research associate in the museum’s Earth Sciences Department, said in a news release.
And never did he and fellow researchers imagine what they would find.
“This may be the most unusual dinosaur discovery I have ever been a part of,” said Patrick O’Connor, the museum’s director of Earth and Space Sciences.
Unusual and also “a scientifically and historically thrilling find for both the museum and the larger Denver community,” said James Hagadorn, curator of geology.
Researchers are calling the dinosaur fossil the oldest and deepest ever found in Denver. It was found 763 feet beneath the ground, encased in rock dated to about 67.5 million years ago.
The vertebra is believed to have belonged to a plant-eater of that Late Cretaceous period. The Rocky Mountain Geology article describes “part of a neural arch that shares similarities to those of ornithopod dinosaurs such as Thescelosaurus or Edmontosaurus.”
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The article adds: “The bone occurs near the top of a sequence capped by carbonaceous mudstone, interpreted to represent a pond- or swamp-like environment.”
This was the environment of the Edmontosaurus, “one of the most populous herbivores” of the era, reads an article in Denver Museum of Nature and Science’s Catalyst magazine, which calls the smaller Thescelosaurus “agile and alert.” Along with the Tyrannosaurus rex, the creatures moved among “towering palm trees, thick vines and lush undergrowth.”
The fossil “offers a rare window into the ecosystem that once existed right beneath modern-day Denver,” Hagadorn said.
And the fossil adds a record to a long list of discoveries made around the metro area over the years.
While being called the oldest dinosaur fossil found in city limits, the Rocky Mountain Geology article mentions older remains found on the peripheries. That includes the skull of “Pops” the Triceratops, uncovered in 1982 in Weld County, and tracks that are the namesake of Triceratops Trail near Golden. The article continues: “Other, much older dinosaur remains are well known from the Jurassic Morrison Formation west of Denver at Dinosaur Ridge.”
The article includes a map of other notable discoveries: the Thornton Torosaurus identified in 2017 and T. rex remains in Littleton (found during apartment construction in 1992) and Boulder (found by a kid while hiking in 2021), not to mention reported finds during Coors Field construction that inspired Dinger, the purple Triceratops mascot. As for the next-deepest find, a Triceratops from Brighton is mapped.
Now that map includes the heart of Denver, City Park.
“Urban paleontological discoveries are rare but often ignite public interest in science and deepen our connection to nature,” researchers wrote in the scientific journal.
That a dinosaur — or perhaps yet more dinosaurs — existed below the Denver Museum of Nature and Science is only fitting, researchers suggested:
“It has potential to be incorporated into exhibits, where it could foster a learning experience that is rarely found in natural history museums. Furthermore, this type of discovery is an important reminder for local communities that science is literally being done below their feet.”
The fossil is now on display at the museum’s “Discovering Teen Rex” exhibit.