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Canada World Heritage SitesDinosaur Provincial ParkAlberta
Seventy-five million years ago, what is now eastern Alberta was a low-lying coastal plain at the edge of a large shallow sea. The climate was subtropical, similar to northern Florida today. Countless creatures flourished there — fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, primitive mammals and about 35 species of dinosaur. When some of these animals died, they lay in river channels and mud flats so their bones were buried in new layers of sand and mud. Over time, a combination of pressure, lack of oxygen and deposition of minerals produced fossils — impressions of the bones, teeth and skin of those creatures that once roamed ancient Alberta. Over more time, new layers of sediments covered the fossils and preserved them. And so it was until the end of the latest Ice Age, 13,000 years ago, a mere wink in geological time, when glacial ice scraped off the upper layers of rock. Huge volumes of meltwater carved deep into the soft sandstone and mudstone strata, exposing the fossil-bearing sediments and, in the process, creating the Red Deer River Valley. Its haunting hoodoos, isolated mesas and low-lying coulees are at the heart of Alberta’s badlands and contain the greatest concentration of Late Cretaceous dinosaur fossils yet found on Earth. More than
300 first-quality dinosaur skeletons have been pulled from a 27-kilometre
stretch along the Red Deer River since digging began there in the 1880s. And
dozens of these now grace museum space in 30 cities around the world. Since
1985 the largest collection of treasures from the park has been housed in
the
Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology, in Drumheller, a two-hour drive northwest
of the park.  World Heritage Centre Web site: Alberta Community Development Web site: 
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