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Unfortunately this is not a trip report, but wanted to let people know who were thinking of making a Montana trip this year that Baisch in glendive shut down for the summer. Shana emailed me the news today. They are trying to keep family safe, and I agree that I think it's best for them. I already prepaid a nonrefundable week out there at a hotel before all the covid went down. I still plan on heading out there, but will have to adjust our fossil plans a bit. I went there 3 years ago with just my daughter, but will have the whole crew in tow this time. The plan was to let everyone collect dinosaur bones 3 days, then invertebrate hunt or random stuff the other days. I plan on doing the atv park one day, and a roadcut north of Malta another, but other than that not sure what else to do. Does anyone know of any other pay to dig sites that are not easily found on the web where you can keep material around there? I know we can observe at the park, and several museums allow kids to do mini digs but not keep things, but my kids want to take home their work. I'm guessing we will just end up settling on invertebrates again. I have the rockhounding Montana book, but if anyone has any great recommendations, I'm always open to suggestions.

From our Fish Dig in Kemmerer, Wyoming (Fish Dig Trip Report), we drove back up to Montana (which was frustrating, as we had just been in this region the previous week, but we were with family members who didn't see the value in spending all day out in the heat looking at rocks...) This was the first of our two days exploring the Hell Creek Formation. For this day, we went to Baisch's Dinosaur Digs (http://www.dailydinosaurdigs.com/). We were in Glendive, Montana, and Baisch's office was not far from town, and really easy to get to. We popped into the office, which turned out to be a small museum containing finds from the ranch, as well as finds donated to them. We got a very brief tutorial, and were shown some samples of common finds in the region. They showed us what bone material would look like, what crocodile scutes would be, what gar scales would look like. It was going to be a super hot day (100+), and they were kind enough to let us start an hour earlier (at 7am). We weren't sure if we would stick it out for a full day, or just do a half day. After a bathroom stop, we gathered up all of our water bags, and piled into their truck. The main owner, Shana, was out in the field already, trying to recover some kind of big bone, so we never got to meet her. Instead, we were driven out into the middle of nowhere by her assistant. While friendly, she didn't know that much about the geology or paleontology of the region. So basically, we were just doing a surface collection/survey on a ranch. Still pretty cool, and my kids loved finding bone fragments around them. The kids scrambled up and down the slopes. We warned them to stay close, and to not put their hands under any rocks, etc. Our guide had a pistol on her belt just in case we ran into rattlesnakes or mountain lions.

I planned a trip with my daughter to head out to Glendive Montana as her birthday present to go collect fossils. As I've posted in the past, fossil hunting was something we started together as we both loved everything to do with the local museum here. I thought what would be better than to go hunt in the badlands for real dinosaur bones. After doing lots of research on here, reading books, and government literature we planned our trip out to legally collect fossils at Baisch's Dinosaur Digs. We planned a trip out for a week, booked 2 half days and 2 full days. This gave us 3 days to hunt for invertebrates(part 2 when I get around to it, probably not until at least next week) and chill. We arrived at the ranch at 8am last Tuesday, and met Shana, who would be running our tours. Marge used to run the tours, but about 2 years back she decided to hang up her boots. Shana gives you a tour of the stuff they've collected over the years, much of which is pretty cool. I wish I had decent pictures of inside there, but my daughter took those ones, and they are a bit blurry. After getting a tour of all the things you can find out there, of which there is a lot, we headed out to the badlands. You can drive with her or take your own vehicle and follow. We chose to follow as I wanted to bring along a portable toilet for my daughter as needed. Shana provides you with a screwdriver, paintbrush, and bags to put your fossils in. For most of the stuff you're finding, that should be sufficient. If you need more stuff, like casting material, hardener, etc, she carries that stuff with her as well when you find something good. I would do it day by day, but really the process is very similar, just the spots are different in what you are looking for. We drive out to a spot and park. From there, we'd hike out a little or lot depending on the site. You start scouring the ground for anything that looks like fossils. At the micro sites, you're pretty much just scouring the ground for chunks of bone, gar scales, teeth, turtle shell, and the like. Other spots we went to, you would check the ground and cliffs. If you found bone, you'd start moving up the wall to see if you could figure out where it was coming from and hope you find something nice. For me, we mostly stayed with the micro stuff, as my daughter just turned 7, is not graceful and was scared about travelling up to higher ground. Most of the bigger and more articulated bones they find are found higher up. We found tons of chunkosaurus and turtle pieces. There's also an unlimited supply of agatized wood if you like that. Overall we had a great time and I'd recommend Baisch's to anyone looking to experience hunting for fossils and actually getting to keep what you find. They keep anything carnivore to help pay for the ranch, but most of what you find is herbivore material. Here are some pics from our trip.

I'm looking at planning a trip to Montana this summer with my daughter who will be turning 7 that week. I've been looking at the Baisch ranch(aka daily dinosaur digs) in Montana as it seems the most flexible schedule wise. We planned on trying to go for a week to hunt Glendive in general, but would really love to spend a few days hunting vertebrates. We obviously plan to do this legally so this leaves us only a few options with that one seeming the best. I'm wondering what kind of experiences you've had if you've gone there. What is the quality of fossils you were able to acquire? I know it says on their page about keeping most fossils. Was there anything you weren't able to keep? Any recommendations on items to bring outside of what's on the page? We've never been vertebrate hunting before so this would be completely new to us. Thanks in advance.