Asteroid:
- Gigantic rock from outer space
- One hit Earth about 65 million years ago and may have totally changed Earth’s climate causing extinction of dinosaurs and most other animals and plants
Badlands:
- Southwestern part of North Dakota that was not touched by the last glacier
- Deep valleys, canyons, and cliffs carved by wind and water
- Colorful because of clinker and other types of rocks and soil layers
Carnivore:
- Meat-eating animal
Cenozoic Era:
- Most recent era
- Began about 65 million years ago
- “Age of Mammals”
- Divided into Tertiary and Quaternary Periods
- Era we live in now
Champsosaur:
- Reptile that lived in swamps and looked something like a crocodile
- A carnivore
Coal:
- Solid fossil fuel created from land vegetation that had been squeezed by pressure for millions of years
- Formed during Cenozoic Era
Eras:
- The four longest divisions of geologic time
Extinct:
- All are gone
Extinction:
- When the last member of a species dies
- All are gone
Fossil:
- Remains of a plant or animal that has been buried in the earth (in rock, soil, ice, etc.)
- Skeleton, bone, shell, or an imprint, such as a footprint
Fossil fuels:
- Formed from the decayed remains of prehistoric (very ancient) plants and animals
- Petroleum, natural gas, and coal
Geologic Time:
- Divides Earth's history into time periods
- Indicates big changes that took place on Earth
- Constantly being refined
Geologists:
- Scientists who study the earth
Geology:
- The scientific study of the earth
Glaciers:
- Gigantic sheets of ice
- Thousands of feet thick
- Moved south over 20 times from Canada into North Dakota
- Pushed everything in its path ahead of it like a giant bulldozer
- Scraped off hills, ground up rocks, and carried huge amounts of earth
- Hills were formed from great heaps of material left by melting glaciers
Herbivore:
- Plant-eating animal
Igneous rock:
- Any rock formed from magma
Lake Agassiz:
- Gigantic lake formed because glaciers in Canada blocked rivers flowing north
- Named after Louis Agassiz, a geologist
- 700 miles long, 200 miles wide, 300 feet deep
- Covered eastern part of North Dakota, part of Minnesota, and parts of Canada
- Has been gone for thousands of years
- Red River Valley in eastern North Dakota is the floor of this prehistoric lake
- Some of the world’s best farmland is located in this ancient lake bed
Lignite:
- Very soft coal that contains a lot of moisture
- Burns fast and does not give off as much heat as other coals
- Surface-mined
- Formed during Tertiary Period of Cenozoic Era
Magma:
- Molten material deep inside the earth
Mesozoic Era:
- From about 248 million years ago to about 65 million years ago
- Lasted about 183 million years
- “Age of Reptiles”
- Dinosaurs lived during this era
Mosasaur:
- Giant lizard that lived in the ocean
- A carnivore
Natural gas:
- Gas fossil fuel created from tiny plants and animals that lived in oceans; squeezed by pressure and exposed to heat for millions of years
- Formed during the Paleozoic Era
Paleontologist:
- Scientist who study fossils
Paleontology:
- Study of the history and life on Earth
- Study of fossils
Paleozoic Era:
- From about 540 million years ago to about 248 million years ago
- Lasted about 292 million years
- Shallow seas came inland several times
- Water completely covered North Dakota
- First forests appeared
- First four-legged animals developed
Petrified wood:
- Stone formed from minerals filling in cells of wood as it decayed
- Looks exactly like the plant that had been there in the first place, except it is stone
- Petrified forest located in Badlands
Petroleum:
- Liquid fossil fuel created from tiny plants and animals that lived in oceans and had been squeezed by pressure for millions of years
- Formed during the Paleozoic Era
Precambrian Era:
- Oldest era
- Era that lasted the longest
- From about 4.5 billion years ago to about 540 million years ago
- Included almost 4 billion years of Earth’s history
- Igneous rock formed during this era
- No animals lived during this era
- Only microscopic plants lived during this era
Pteranodon:
- Flying reptile
- Had a wing-span of about 20 feet
- A carnivore
Quaternary Period:
- Part of the Cenozoic Era
- Began about 1.8 million years ago
- “Ice Age”
- Glaciers formed and did not melt for thousands of years
- Mastodons and woolly mammoths lived in North Dakota about 11,000 years ago
- Period we live in now
Scoria:
- Type of red rock formed from lignite coal burning underground
- Found in the Badlands
- Sometimes crushed and used as a road surface material instead of gravel
- Adds color and beauty to the Badlands
- Also called clinker
Sediment:
- Small pieces of rock and dirt carried by water or wind
Sedimentary rock:
- Rock formed by particles of sediment pressed together
Surface-mined:
- Top layers of soil are scraped away and coal is scooped up with giant shovel-type machines
- Lignite is mined this way
Teredo-bored petrified wood:
- North Dakota’s state fossil
- 60 million years old
- Little clams called teredos drilled tiny holes into wood before it fossilized
Tertiary Period:
- Part of the Cenozoic Era
- Began about 65 million years ago
- The last of the inland seas drained away
- Rocky Mountains were formed in western United States
- Palm trees and tropical flowers grew well in North Dakota
- Coal formed during this period
- Camels, tiny three-toed horses, and rhinoceros lived in North Dakota
- About 50 million years ago North Dakota’s climate was becoming cooler and drier
- About 30 million years ago swamps were replaced by grasslands
Triceratops:
- Most common dinosaur in North Dakota
- Had a big horn above each eye and a smaller horn on its nose
- Had a bony plate at the back of its skull that looked like a high collar
- Could weigh as much as 10,000 pounds
- An herbivore
Tyrannosaurus rex:
- About 40 feet long and 20 feet tall
- Walked on two powerful legs
- Had arms only about three feet long
- Had strong jaws about four feet long
- Weighed about 12,000 pounds
- Had 50 to 60 sharp teeth
- A carnivore
- Could eat up to 500 pounds of meat in one bite
Williston Basin:
- Bowl-shaped region of sedimentary rock covering much of western North Dakota, as well as parts of South Dakota, Montana, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan
- Contains a lot of petroleum and natural gas
Wisconsinan glacier:
- Last glacier that moved over North Dakota
- Entered North Dakota about 40,000 years ago
- Stayed about 28,000 years
- Melted away about 12,000 years ago
- Covered almost all of North Dakota except for the southwest corner