My Seymour Experience

Gabriel Avritscher

Mr. Roddy/Dr. Ott

A-Term

My Seymour Experience

Going into this trip, I didn't know what to expect. I had never been to nor heard of Seymour and I had no prior experience with the field of paleontology. As to the town itself, I'm not gonna lie and say that I wish I could live there because it's really not the greatest of places. There's really not much to do (save for a museum and a small, makeshift movie theater), but what was by far the best part of the town, and the trip, wasn't the infrastructure or buildings. It was the people. From the always smiling Karl Porter to even the non-residents of the town, Dr. Bakker and Mr. Temple, that's what really made this trip unique. Well, there's also the whole paleontology thing, but I truly think that it would have been a much different, worse trip had we not met or conversed with these people. As great as paleontology is, there's no way to sugarcoat the fact that you're simply gonna not find things for a long stretch of time and you're just gonna be excavating dirt, and that does get boring and tiring. So, without these people at the field with us, the boredom would have been a lot more present. From Dr. Bakker's joke about prison or community service to Mr. Temple's hilarious Air Force stories, it was truly the people that made this trip exciting and enjoyable. Again, not to say that paleontology isn't any of that, but there are stretches of time where your mind begins to wander off and you start taking more breaks, which is something that I believe is just part of the paleontology experience, and being around fun people is probably the best way to manage it. But what's really unique and special about paleontology is when you do find something, When it came to my most exciting find, a Dimetrodon jaw, I didn't really know I had found anything for a while. I almost threw it away, too, but luckily, I didn't. Overall, I really enjoyed this experience, from the large amounts of food to skipping rocks on the Brazos River. Although some things may not have gone as planned during the length of the trip, it didn't take too much from the experience as a whole, an experience which I don't know yet whether or not I'll choose to partake in again. 

My Seymour Experience- Ren

After hearing about the past trips, the Paleontology trip sounded exciting and like a really unique opportunity. It turned out to be both of these things. Working alongside experts such as Mr. Temple, Dr. Bakker, and Mr. Fliss, I was blown away by their endless knowledge on the fossils. Before going on this trip, I didn't really think about the fact that we were working with the HMNS and people who do this for a living. I was also pleasantly surprised when I saw how many fossils were in the small area which we had been excavating. I was also fascinated with their techniques for getting fossils out of the ground without damaging them. I had not known that plastering the area around a fossil and flipping it out of the ground was a common practice among paleontologists. When I was working with Dr. Conolley in Jamaica on an archaeology dig, the way we excavated was a lot different. While excavating in Jamaica, we used trowels to slowly go layer by layer into the soil and sifted through the dirt we had found. Instead of this, we used very small and precise tools such as awls, dental picks, and screwdrivers to slowly dig around any fossils we found. One similarity that I found in both of these excavations is the techniques of taking field notes. Both situations called for taking notes and drawing sketches of finds with detailed measurements showing the relation between the finds. Field notes are very important when excavating because they document the location and orientation of the finds as well as any other important details. After getting the opportunity to work in both the field of archaeology and paleontology, I understand the importance of very small details which may not seem important but can tell us so many things about the fossil or artifact. I loved being able to literally dig into the past and I would recommend this course to other students and encourage more people to go on a paleontology dig!

My Seymour Experience - Emily Wilburn

In all honesty, I was not looking forward to the paleo trip at first. I signed up for the experience and to say I went on this trip but I was not enthused by the idea of it at first. That completely changed by the time we arrived at the ranch. Once we walked in I noticed the stuffed birds hanging from the ceiling and was a bit weirded out but then I saw thing ping pong table and knew it would be a good time. That night Catherine and I played a few games as well as the rest of the group. 

The work in the field happened all throughout the week and I learned so much from it. It was so neat to be able to learn from experts in the field such as Dr. Robert Bakker and David Temple. 

By the end of the trip, I learned what all it took in the field when it came to prepping the fossil to bring to the museum, as well as learned what prepping went into it once it was in the museum before it could be displayed. I learned how to have patience and stay positive even when there was no guarantee I would find anything. 

Overall it was an amazing experience and I would recommend this trip to everyone

My Seymour Experience: Tyler Holland

Tyler Holland

Going on the Seymour trip, at first, sounded really fun. Growing up I had always wanted to be a paleontologist and had been pretty much obsessed with dinosaurs and everything about them. After having a nice talk with Dr. Ott and Mr. Roddy about what the trip entailed and what we would be doing, I didn't want to go as much. This was probably because through the talk, my mind only gathered some key words: Scorpions, Spiders, Hot afternoons, and Cold mornings. At this point I'm dreading going and am wondering how I got myself into this, but I packed my things and got ready for a fabulous 8 hour car ride. Once we got there and got into the routine of what we were doing, I thoroughly enjoyed the trip. It was pretty much everything that I had wanted to do growing up and I truly did have a lot of fun digging through dirt for hours looking for things that looked slightly different than dirt. A thing that I really loved about the trip was getting to know some of the people we worked with (Paleontologists are pretty funny people). Dr. Bakker bestowed a lot of knowledge on us and was really helpful in the whole process of learning exactly what we were doing/looking for and how to find it. It might have taken a while to learn all of the names of the dinosaurs we were digging up, and even longer to stop saying dinosaurs since they technically "weren't around at that time", but in the end it was a great project that I had fun working on. We also got to spend a lot of time together as a group at the ranch and eat (a lot), spend time outside, and spend time inside because it got cold at night too. I really liked going to Seymour and while I am going to try to go somewhere else next year to learn newer things, I definitely recommend this trip to all of my other peers.

My Seymour Experience - Catherine Hudson

Having joined the Post Oak community in January, there was a limited choice of A-terms. I love traveling so I decided to choose the Paleontology A-term because even though it wasn’t Costa Rica or China, Seymour was still a place I had never been. I’ll admit that prior to this trip I did not ever express a particular interest in the field and had several apprehensions about spending hours brushing dirt around in search of bones that were not even that of dinosaurs. Although I cannot say this trip to Seymour has given me the desire to become a paleontologist, I can say I have a newfound appreciation and respect for them. Their enthusiasm and passion for their work is truly fascinating and it was amazing to see them pick out rock-like pieces and be able to identify them as specifically as the left elbow bone of an amphibian. I personally didn’t mind working all day out in the field, as the long hours went by faster due to the favorable weather and discussions with classmates. As I learned on this trip, there are multiple jobs that contribute to the work on the dig site. For example, hiking and prospecting for new areas, drawing the fossils, taking field notes, searching the spoil pile,  “mushrooming” jackets, etc. With all these options, it is hard to get bored as whenever you got restless doing one task, you could just move on to the next. My preferred tasks were those with an end in sight: digging around a jacket and searching the spoil pile, and taking the jacket out of the ground and finding bones and teeth, respectively. Outside of simply digging, I enjoyed the drives and hikes through the beautiful Texas countryside and the downtime with classmates. I’m really glad I chose this A-term, despite initial hesitation, as I thoroughly enjoyed this trip and made some great memories.

My Seymoure Experience - Andreas Cantu

Andreas Cantu

Digging Deeper 

When I first found out that I was going to Seymour Texas to dig outside all day, I am not going to lie I wanted to leave and never come back to school, but because of some dumb laws saying I could not do that I ended up having to go. But after driving 8 hours all the way to the middle of no where and digging outside to search for animals that roamed the earth millions of years ago, I found that it was actually not bad at all. I learned so much information about paleontology and what it takes to be a paleontologist. I also gained a new respect for paleontologist because, let me tell you I could not do what they do for a job. I also enjoyed being away from the city and spent my time appreciating the country and hillbilly accents. Another great thing about this trip was all the people we had working with us, there were some new comers like us, and some experts like David Temple and Dr. Bakker, and hearing what they had to say about these creatures was truly astonishing. So, yes I did enjoy this trip and what it taught I hope to never forget. 

Thank You 

My Seymour Experience - Brandon

I think this Aterm was a great one. It was definitely a chance of scenery from the big city to a smaller town setting, and going out into the field every day made it...different. I think the best part was being able to be more independent, as I was able to choose when I break to film and when I go back to excavating. I feel like it was a great experience to have, being able to create a video to show the community while also being able to further my knowledge in video creation throughout this trip. It was fun going out in the desert and digging constantly every day, but also going out and creating memories and bonds with my classmates. It was definitely a good final Aterm for me to adventure on before I leave the school.