The trail of the Loup; being a history of the Loup River region . ld and wide,With dykes on either hand, by ocean on the right the distant ocean was salt the springs that fed the marsh between. A seventy-five footMosasauruB fromthe Cretaceous bedsof Kansas. PHYSICAL FEATURES 21 And yet the marsh was slowly becoming upland, though the climatewas still moist and warm. A tropical vegetation of myriad species of giantferns and noble cycads again clad the land with brilliant hues. These im-mense thickets and forests teemed with animal life. Most striking werethe giant Bro
The trail of the Loup; being a history of the Loup River region . ld and wide,With dykes on either hand, by ocean on the right the distant ocean was salt the springs that fed the marsh between. A seventy-five footMosasauruB fromthe Cretaceous bedsof Kansas. PHYSICAL FEATURES 21 And yet the marsh was slowly becoming upland, though the climatewas still moist and warm. A tropical vegetation of myriad species of giantferns and noble cycads again clad the land with brilliant hues. These im-mense thickets and forests teemed with animal life. Most striking werethe giant Brontosaurus of the Wyoming fossil beds, often measuring 60feet in length; the Atlantosaurus, which reached the phenomenal lengthof 80 feet; and the lately dicovered gigantic Stegosaurus, remarkable for aseries of huge bony plates mounted along the back. As if these curiouscreatures were not enough to give character to the time we find uncanny,birdlike reptiles, pterosaurs, swarming the upper air and adding much tothis the strangest and most interesting of Nebraska forest of late Cretaceous times. The Cretaceous period marks of the end of the MesozoicEra. A general subsidence now set in which seems to have embraced eventhe Rocky Mountain region. The latter, together with the eastward-lyingplain, was once more brought to the water level. A marine bay brokenorthward from the Gulf of Mexico and, before the middle of the period,covered Texas. Indian Territory, part of Kansas the western half of Nebras-ka, and much territory lying northwestward. Thus the Rocky Mountain nucleus was again reduced to groupsof islands, as in Paleozoic times, and all western Nebraska 22 THE TRAIL OF THE LOUP was once more, tho now for the last time, a part of the oceanbed. Toward the laber part of the period the continent slowly rose againand the great western internal sea was narrowed and made shallow, theconnection between the Gulf ana the Arctic Seas was interrupted, lakesof fresh
Size: 1555px × 1607px
Photo credit: © The Reading Room / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookauthorfoghthwh, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookyear1906
