The Blog FAQ

By Amy Nutt

 Dinosaurs have long been a source of fascination and the inspiration for many stories and scientific explorations. Fossilized dinosaur bones have been discovered in different parts of the world for centuries, with the first scientifically recorded specimen called Megalosaurus unearthed near Oxford in 1824 by William Buckland.

Since then paleontologists and dinosaur experts have been coordinating digs worldwide with many stunning skeletons now on display in national museum collections.

Where Are Most Dinosaur Fossils Found?

North America is the number one place to look when it comes to these prehistoric creatures. China and Mongolia come in second with ‘dragon’ bones (as the locals called them), having been uncovered for thousands of years.

In the US more kinds of dinosaurs have been found than anywhere else in the world and Dinosaur Provincial Park in Alberta, Canada has yielded the highest numbers of species found, with 37 different kinds unearthed.

Everything from the Tyrannosaurus to the Brachiosaurus has been carefully removed piece by piece from the North American landscape and then painstakingly put back together.

Recent discoveries include the bizarre Therizinosaurid dinosaur in Utah (which has a combination of bird-like features and large claws) and a four-ton mummified Hardrosaur nicknamed Dakota. Dakota was unearthed in North Dakota and is an extremely well preserved, rare find that has paleontologists around the world excited.

Why Is North America So Conducive To Finding Dinosaur Bones?

For animals to become fossilized certain conditions must be present at the time of death. The body has to be in a place where it can be buried right away so that decomposition and disintegration of the bones can’t take place. Along with this entombment certain minerals need to infiltrate the bones to make them resistant to crushing, a process called permineralization (this is an extremely slow process that is integral to the formation of fossils and petrified remains). Usually floodplains, river systems or the complete opposite, dry, arid deserts allow for this to happen.

In the fluvial settings (places where flowing water is present) dinosaurs were immediately buried in the river channels or covered up by sediment from floodwaters. During this process the scavengers and bacteria had no time to destroy the carcass and the mineral rich water could permeate the bones making them almost like stone. Entombed and preserved in this sediment they become fossilized.

Dinosaurs dying in the desert were also preserved due to a lack of organisms present in the arid environment that could break down the body. Scavengers were less attracted to the desiccated carcasses and so the sand buried the intact remains. During wet seasons rainfall infused the bones with minerals and fossilization took place.

These fluvial and desert environments were present across North America during the time of the dinosaurs and allowed the bones to be preserved, waiting for discovery.

Discovery

For dinosaur bones to be discovered certain conditions must also be present in the current environment. Long buried fossils become exposed when geologic uplifting (the process that forces land upwards) brings the old sedimentary layers close to the earth’s surface. Erosion then exposes these sedimentary layers and consequently any fossilized creations. Through careful excavation and specialized tools we can then finish the job nature started.

Prime regions for finding dinosaur bones are deserts with bluffs, buttes and cliffs, canyons, riverbanks and flood plains, mountainous zones and eroded hillsides. These places also need to be open and unpopulated areas where the bare earth is available for paleontologists to dig for remains.

This is why, geographically, North America has the perfect environment for digging up the past.

When searching for information on dinosaurs be sure to check out the great articles and resources at Discovery Channel’s re-vamped dinosaur blog.

Your Source For Answers About Blogs

Make Money Setting Up Blogs
By James Laney

 Blogging is now a great means of marketing one’s business and products on the internet. This is why businesspersons are today turning to blogs for their marketing purposes. With a blog incorporated in a website, the business owner is more than likely to get more hits for his/her website. People frequent blogs, and when visiting the blog, these people are sure to have a look at the product or services you offer on your website.

Not all business people are computer savvy enough to create their own blogs. Therefore, if you have the necessary expertise to create blogs, you could consider creating blogs for these businesses. Most of the online businesses like to have blogs that match their website or their brick and mortar store, with the same style. Of course, you will have to charge for creating blogs for them; a fee of $500 is rather reasonable for the installation and setup of the blog. You could also charge some monthly maintenance fees where you ensure that everything runs smoothly on the blog. Once you create a blog for the businessperson, it should be simple for them to use, as if they were typing on a text editor.

With a blog, business people get to meet one another through the computer, and can thus discuss business matters. The businessperson gets to know more people through the blog, and thus builds up their list of contacts, which in turn is beneficial to the business. These new contacts may very well turn out to be customers to the business!

Moreover, with the right material in the blogs, the business gets a chance of getting a higher search engine ranking with blogs. This is because search engines tend to rank websites based on link popularity, and on the indexing of the site. As blogs are frequented by bloggers, a blog in a website increases the link popularity, and traffic to the website. Blogs also cut down on the businessperson’s investment as blogs are low-cost alternatives to marketing. It is a great way of getting a product marketed.

You will have to do some advertising yourself on your services of setting up of blogs for businesses. All you have to do is to place some banner ads on the internet on sites where people may link to for information regarding internet marketing. Once you develop a small clientele for your business, these same people will spread your expertise around wherein you are sure to get many more customers for yourself!

Many sites help a computer user create a blog. Therefore, you too do not have to have that much computer knowledge to set up a blog. You just have to look for the appropriate sites that provide information on the setting up of a blog. You just have to download the software; and it is usually free. There is no investment on your side; so long as you have the capacity of creating content for a blog, this is a business really worth placing yourself in.

When James isn’t writing about how to make money online he can be found at either Tiger Woods 09 Cheats or Guitar Hero 3 Cheats writing about video game cheats.

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