Meet a Paleontologist
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© Nebraskaland Magazine |
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Mike Voorhies is a vertebrate paleontologist. That is, a scientist who studies fossil animals with back bones.
Mike grew up in Orchard, Nebraska and became interested in fossils as a young boy. He studied geology and biology in college to become a paleontologist.
Mike teaches paleontology classes at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln. He studies prehistoric horses, rhinos, camels, elephants, rodents of all kinds, and many other species that lived in Nebraska during a portion of the Age of Mammals from 15 million years ago through the present (late Miocene Epoch, the Pliocene Epoch, and the Pleistocene Epoch).
Mike found the skull of a rhino calf eroding out of a ravine in 1971. The skull was part of a complete skeleton embedded in volcanic ash. It was one of dozens of fossil skeletons that have been uncovered at the Ashfall Fossil Site.
