In summer '04, support from NSF and Colgate, including the department's Boyce Fund, made it possible to visit Bayan Zag ("Flaming Cliffs") in the Gobi Desert where Colgate's dinosaur egg was discovered in 1923. It's an amazing place where red sandstones form an impressive escarpment sculpted into stunning buttes and pillars. Having a chance to explore the area where our Oviraptor egg made history, not just for Colgate but also for paleontology, added an emotional element to walking in Roy Chapman Andrews' footsteps 90 years after his famous expeditions. Even though dinosaur eggs yield extraordinary paleontological insights, the factors that favored their burial and fossilization (taphonomy) are largely unknown. Future experiments with Colgate students will be designed with Bayan Zag paleoenvironments in mind to improve an understanding of dinosaur egg taphonomy.

      My NSF grant also enabled me last summer to investigate a new field area in central Siberia with Russian colleagues. We share ongoing interests in uncovering the geologic relationship that may have existed between rocks exposed in northern North America (Alaska), Northern Europe (Ural Mountains), Siberia (Salair), and Asia (Mongolia) - continents that were isolated from each other by ocean basins in the Paleozoic. Future research should show if the fossils we collected explain what caused the mass extinction of oceanic life that brought the Silurian period to a catastrophic close.

      In Fall 2005, I'll be teaching my Core Distinction course on "Darwin and the Victorian Age of Discovery" while directing Colgate's study group to the University of Manchester, England. We'll scour the Yorkshire coast for Jurassic fossils, visit natural history museums in Whitby and London, pay our respects at Darwin's grave in Westminster Abbey, and tour the Darwin family estate in Kent.

      In the past year, it's been terrific to hear excellent talks given at Colgate or at geology conferences by Doug Crowe '80, David Goldsmith '93, Katrina Gobetz '94, Dave Sunderlin '99, Emily Hirshorn '01, and Christy Visaggi '02. Thanks for staying in touch and I look forward to seeing everyone on upcoming trips to Hamilton!