Many people travel along the Southern Parkway from I-15 exit 2 along to Hurricane. Travelers pass by new housing developments, the St. George Airport, and Sand Hollow Reservoir. The knowledgeable traveler might be aware of fossil sites in Warner Valley when they pass that exit. However, many are completely unaware of fossil sites beneath the road itself. These sites, known as the Southern Parkway Project (SPP) were discovered in 2011 during surveys conducted before the road’s construction. Our Curator, Andrew Milner, was the lead investigator for this project and discovered many fossil localities in the area including plants, dinosaur and other tracks, and teeth.
One of the prominent fossil-bearing rock formations along the Southern Parkway (SR-7) is called the Kayenta Formation (~190-195 million years old). It represents one of the red rock geologic units that southwestern Utah is famous for. This Early Jurassic formation was deposited by river systems that flowed across flat terrain in a very arid environment. Even though the climate was extreme, plants and animals flourished.
Two important sites were discovered in 2011 and excavated prior to, and during construction of the Southern Parkway. One of these localities, called Ws538, is very unique because it preserved fossils rarely seen in the Kayenta Formation. It produced hundreds of well-preserved plant fossils, including cycads, ferns, horsetails, and conifers. Additionally, fossil teeth from a variety of animals were discovered such as large and small meat-eating dinosaurs, plant-eating dinosaurs (Scelidosaurus-like), three kinds of crocodylians, fishes, and a possible flying reptile and synapsid. Many of these teeth are too small to easily see without a microscope, and were discovered upon closer inspection of plant samples from this site. These teeth are all on the scale of a few millimeters but their perfect preservation is enough to identify different animals and different tooth types. A variety of dinosaur tracks such as Eubrontes, Grallator, Kayentapus, and Anomoepus were also found, along with swim traces of fishes, and meating-eating and plant-eating dinosaurs.
The second locality, called the Hamblin Tracksite, produced more than 600 footprints. It is by far the richest occurrence of Anomoepus tracks (produced by plant-eating dinosaurs) known from western North America. This site also preserved a running trackway made by a large theropod dinosaur. This tracksite was mapped and photographed in detail, and many fossils were collected and/or replicated.
Hundreds of specimens were collected from both of these sites and are now housed at the St. George Dinosaur Discovery Site (SGDS) and the Natural History Museum of Utah (UMNH). Today, the Southern Parkway (SR-7) rests on top of these fossil localities, and the majority of these sites were removed for highway construction. Some examples of the amazing fossils from this area are currently on display in the lobby at the SGDS until January 2025, come and see it!