DocentDoings

  DRT December 8, 2021 Holiday Party The Docents met a Taix's Restaurant on Sunset Blvd. for their annual Holiday Party after a two-year hiatus due to the Covid pandemic.  Double click on images below to enlarge image. Cell Phone Pictures The Docents       The Prizes The Meals Trout Beef and Chicken Videos Hi Mary                                    Dear Docents, Tiffany asked me to tell you how sad she was to not be able to join the gathering this year. She loved the photo of the group and said, “what a happy looking crew” and hoped you felt that “she was there in spirit.” She wanted me to share her regrets with you and her “absolute delight” at seeing the lovely photo of all of you.   I too wish I could have been there and want to thank you for the warm “Mary” video!   Thanks to all ~mary~ Carolyn Part 1     Carolyn Part 2

 From the Smithsonian: Other Mammals, Not Dinosaurs, Kept Our Ancestors Down The asteroid impact that ended the Cretaceous gave our mammalian ancestors, the therians, an edge over their mammalian competitors The ancient mammal Gobioconodon (right) squabbles with a therian mammal over a meal in the Late Cretaceous. (Corbin Rainbolt) By Riley Black smithsonianmag.com July 13, 2021 Dinosaurs so thoroughly dominated the ancient world that they suppressed the e

 Two Farmers Found the Largest Dinosaur Ever Unearthed in Australia The long-necked herbivore’s length measured the span of a basketball court, stood at two stories, and weighed an estimated 70 tons It took over a decade to identify the dinosaur bones because of the remote location of the bones, the fragile state they were in, and their massive size and weight that at times require a forklift to move. ( Rochelle Lawrence ) By Elizabeth Gamillo smithsonianmag.com June 9, 2021

From Smithsonian online: Dinosaurs Evolved Flight at Least Three Times A new study finds that many feathered dinosaurs were more aerodynamic than previously thought A Microraptor , a small four-winged dinosaur that could fly, eats a fish. (Emily Willoughby / Stocktrek Images via Getty Images) By Riley Black smithsonianmag.com June 7, 2021 Flight is a relatively rare ability. Many animals crawl, slither, burrow, walk and swim, but comparatively few have the ab

  Park Ranger Stumbles Upon Treasure Trove of Several-Million-Year-Old Fossils in Northern California Paleontologists found hundreds of Miocene fossils, including an 8-million-year-old mastodon, at an undisclosed location in the Sierra Nevada foothills The treasure trove discovery began when park ranger and naturalist Greg Francek from the East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD) first stumbled upon a petrified forest while on patrol in the Mokelumne River Watershed, located in the Sierra Nevada. ( Jason Halley, California State University, Chico ) By Elizabeth Gamillo smithsonianmag.com

An Evolutionary Timeline of Homo Sapiens Scientists share the findings that helped them pinpoint key moments in the rise of our species By Brian Handwerk SMITHSONIANMAG.COM | Feb. 2, 2021, 8 a.m. The long evolutionary journey that created modern humans began with a single step—or more accurately—with the ability to walk on two legs. One of our earliest-known ancestors, Sahelanthropus , began the slow transition from ape-like movement some six million years ago, but Homo sapiens wouldn’t show up for more than five million years. During that long interim, a menagerie of different human species lived, evolved a