Dinosaur Sighting: Roadside Triceratops

While spending the week at Utah’s Dinosaur National Monument looking for fossils with the Utah Museum of Natural History field crew, two graduate students and I took one afternoon off to visit nearby Dinosaur, Colorado. The small town has certainly taken dinosaurs as its mascots. In addition to the streets named after dinosaurs—you can travel down Stegosaurus Freeway or amble along “Antrodemus” Alley—the town’s main drag is festooned with a number of goofy-looking dinosaurs, including a strange Triceratops. The sculpture has the standard accoutrements of the famous dinosaur—the three horns and the frill—but the super-long snout, molars and tongue make this playground ornament one creepy Triceratops.

Have you seen a prehistoric creature in an unusual place? Submissions of dinosaurs—and other ancient beasts—should be sent to [email protected].

Riley Black | | READ MORE

Riley Black is the author of The Last Days of the Dinosaurs and many other books. She is a science correspondent for Smithsonian magazine covering fossils and natural history, and she writes about the prehistoric past for a variety of publications.