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SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY MUSEUM May 22, 2013; 09:30 AM San Bernardino County Museum scientists excavating an Ice Age mammoth skeleton from the Tule Springs area north of Las Vegas have found a skull and lower jaw of an ancient horse never before reported at the site or in Nevada. Horses are not uncommon in the Tule Springs fossil record, but not Equus scotti, a large horse common in much of western North America during the Pleistocene Epoch, or Ice Age. Las Vegas-area volunteers were instrumental in the discovery. “Our research funding from the Bureau of Land Management includes a strong public outreach component,” said Kathleen Springer, the museum’s senior curator of geological sciences and lead scientist for the research program in the upper Las Vegas Wash. “Because of this, we set up Nevada’s first paleontology-based site stewardship program, getting local citizens involved in our research. And now it’s paid off — in a big way.” Springer discovered the fossil site in 2003, during survey conducted by museum scientists and funded by the Las Vegas district office of the Bureau of Land Management. The original find — a tusk and tooth of a mammoth just peeking out at the surface — suggested that multiple parts of the skeleton might be present. In 2012, Springer’s mammoth site was selected for excavation as part of the BLM’s celebration of 50 years of science at Tule Springs. The presence of multiple bones made it ideal for excavation by site stewards working with museum paleontologists. Brushing through desert sediments at the […]

By Jean West-Watanabe The natural training approach to equine behavior has highlighted many new things about horses and their innate behaviors and instincts. One of those behaviors is that horses will store pain and stress in their bodies, learning to block pain out mentally so as not to show signs of weakness. Both domestic horses and their wild relatives are as inclined to do this for as long as they can, because they are prey animals and weakness can often mean death. It’s the very thing that predators look for when stalking herd animals. Horses will avoid showing weakness even in the comfort of their own backyards or barns. By the time a horse eventually favors a limb, leg and neck flexion have been compromised, the problem has reached an intolerable stage of pain and stress, and attention is needed immediately. What most people don’t know is that the stress and pain have already been stored there for quite some time, and early intervention can be helpful in preventing performance issues. The Masterson Method is becoming a nationally known therapy for innovative bodywork and is excellent in releasing this stored pain and stress for a better performance horse.  It all began in 1997 in Fairfield, Iowa, where Jim Masterson, the renowned equine bodyworker for USET Endurance Teams, FEI World Cup and World Games competition horses, began to take interest in Equine Massage. Jim noticed that horses would show neurological responses to light touch, releasing tension and stress from their body. Deep eye blinks, quivering lower lips,