Dinosaurs lived during most of the Mesozoic Era (235 to 65 million years ago), on every continent on Earth. In Maryland, each of three Mesozoic time periods in which dinosaurs live is represented in its geology — Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous. Therefore, it is not surprising that Maryland has produced more dinosaur bones than almost any other state east of the Mississippi River.
Dinosaur Alley
Maryland's "Dinosaur Trail" occupies the geologic region that runs parallel to the Route 1 corridor between Washington and Baltimore. The rock layers in this area are about 100 million years old and fall in the Early Cretaceous Period (144 to 65 million years ago). They contain one of the largest concentrations of dinosaur fossils on the East Coast. Thousands of fossils have been found in the gray and red clays near Laurel, Maryland.
Many different dinosaur fossils have been found in a section of the Dinosaur Trail called "Dinosaur Alley," including predators resembling Acroncanthosaurus, small Deinonychus-like meat eaters, the armored dinosaurs, Princonodon, duck bill-like Tentontosaur, and the Maryland State dinosaur, Astrondon johnstoni, a sauropod.
One hundred million years ago, this area was a broad, flat delta with slow, curving rivers. Remains of dinosaurs, plants and other animals were washed by floodwaters into oxbow lakes that formed at sharp bends in the rivers. There, the remains became trapped, were covered with sediment, and slowly fossilized. The Fossils here in the "Muirkirk Deposit" area are from these ancient oxbow lakes.
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