'Entire ecosystem' of fossils 8.7M years old found under Los Angeles high school(www.theguardian.com)
86 pointsby cpach2 days ago3 comments
  • HarHarVeryFunny2 days ago
    Apparently "sabre-toothed" salmon is really a misnomer - more like tusked salmon.

    https://news.uoregon.edu/saber-no-more-giant-prehistoric-sal...

    Another very cool fossil site in LA is the La Brea Tar Pits museum, which still has tar pits on the museum grounds, and has real sabre-tooths (lions) and other critters like mammoths that got trapped in the tar pits.

    • hodgesrm2 days ago
      The coolest and most surprising part is that the tar pits are still there! Apparently the seeps have been there for tens of thousands of years. [0] (Fun LA tourist activity: jump in yourself and contribute to the fossil record.)

      I was similarly surprised to find that something similar occurs on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico. This came to many people's attention after the Macondo well blowout. [1]

      [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Brea_Tar_Pits

      [1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S09670...

      • teachrdana day ago
        Fun fact: la brea means "the tar", so the La Brea Tar Pits literally translates to "the the tar tar pits".
        • envpa day ago
          Another joins the ranks of Chai Tea, Naan Bread, and Lake Michigan :D
          • SllXa day ago
            The others I knew but Lake Michigan I did not, which prompted me to look it up:

            > The name derives from a gallicized variant of the original Ojibwe word ᒥᓯᑲᒥ (mishigami),[c] meaning "large water" or "large lake".

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan

            TIL. To be fair, there is a whole landmass right next to that mishigami sharing a name we do need to distinguish it from.

            • BobaFloutista day ago
              It's kind of funny how much the sounds of mishigami feel like they could equally have come from Hebrew or Japanese. Interesting overlap of mouth-feel.
          • OJForda day ago
            To be fair, 'naan bread' is like 'toona fish' or 'feta cheese' which AmE does in English anyway.
        • mturmona day ago
          Related fun fact: The actual tar pits, and the art museum adjacent to it, are basically at the intersection of La Brea Blvd. and La Cienega Blvd., which translates to:

          A main tourist attraction of LA is at the intersection of Tar Pits Blvd. and Swamp Blvd.

      • njarboea day ago
        I quite enjoy visiting the La Brea Tar Pits and often do when I'm in LA. The geologist in me really enjoys seeing the natural oil seeps. The area around the museum has large open grassy areas. Often new seeps develop in the grass and you'll see an orange cone placed next to a new spot of oil with bubbles slowly growing and busting with the strong smell of tar/asphalt.
      • conradeva day ago
        Yeah – they put cones around the park where the tar is still peeking through the grass. Watch your step!
    • anonymousiam2 days ago
      (Link to the George C. Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits.)

      https://tarpits.org/experience-tar-pits/museum-exhibitions

    • jrh3a day ago
      Tusked salmon at best.
    • helpfulContrib2 days ago
      Misnomer? I don't agree.

      Its definitely "a big pointy tooth dominating the mouth" kind of feature.

      Could also have been called a snaggle-tooth salmon, I guess ..

      In any case, definitely an interesting fish.

  • mtalantikite2 days ago
    So you're telling me Encino Man wasn't fiction
    • lenerdenator2 days ago
      That, and it's really not nice to refer to a basement bar filled with old Sunset Strip glam metal musicians as "fossils".
      • brcmthrowawaya day ago
        The Sunset Strip is really a shadow of its former self

        LA is dead

    • bloopernova2 days ago
      Fun fact: in the UK, Encino Man was titled California Man
      • vundercinda day ago
        What’s extra-goofy is I’m pretty sure Encino barely had more recognition in the rest of the US than it does in the UK, before that movie came out. Like, if not for the film, I expect I’d still not be aware of it. So changing it for the UK for (presumably) reasons of familiarity doesn’t make a ton of sense.

        It sounds a lot better, too. Should have kept the name.

      • doodlebugging2 days ago
        So if I have this right then a movie made about kids who find a skunk ape and take him to high school to party with them could be titled Orlando Man here in the states but would end up being titled Florida Man in the UK?
        • bloopernovaa day ago
          Now that would be a fun found-footage movie.
          • IncreasePostsa day ago
            That's essentially the first trailer for GTA6
      • havbluea day ago
        If I remember the movie, Paulie Shore presented him as "Estonia Man".
  • jkestnera day ago
    That’d be a hell of a magnet program.