All hail the Metasequoia.Byline: The Register-Guard Quick, name the state fossil of Alaska. Knew the answer right away, didn't you? It's the ancient and noble Mammuthus primigenius, better known as the wooly wool·y adj. & n. Variant of woolly. Adj. 1. wooly - having a fluffy character or appearance flocculent, woolly soft - yielding readily to pressure or weight 2. mammoth. Ohio? OK, way too easy. Everyone knows the charming trilobite trilobite (trī`ləbīt'), subphylum of the phylum Arthropoda that includes a large group of extinct marine animals that were abundant in the Paleozoic era. They represent more than half of the known fossils from the Cambrian period. Isotelus is the official state fossil of the Buckeye State. Virginia? Gotcha (jargon, programming) gotcha - A misfeature of a system, especially a programming language or environment, that tends to breed bugs or mistakes because it both enticingly easy to invoke and completely unexpected and/or unreasonable in its outcome. : It's that devil-may-care mollusk mollusk: see Mollusca. mollusk or mollusc Any of some 75,000 species of soft-bodied invertebrate animals (phylum Mollusca), many of which are wholly or partly enclosed in a calcium carbonate shell secreted by the mantle, a soft , Chesapecten jeffersonius. And Oregon? Trick question: The state has no official fossil. But at the urging of Newport resident Guy DeTorrice, an amateur paleontologist (and Homo sapiens), state Rep. Alan Brown, R-Newport, has introduced a resolution naming the Metasequoia as Oregon's official fossil. DeTorrice makes a compelling case for the Metasequoia, or as compelling a case as anyone can make for honoring a fossil. For starters, he points out that Oregon is the only Western state without an official fossil, an unhappy distinction that no doubt has disturbed many Oregonians' slumber. DeTorrice adds that the Metasequoia, also known as the dawn redwood, had the rare and endearing trait of shedding its needles every fall. Actually, it still has that trait. Turns out the Metasequoia, which was believed to have been extinct for 3 million years, was found in the 1940s in a remote valley in China. Since then, the tree has been widely propagated, with three dawn redwoods growing on the University of Oregon campus The University of Oregon campus in Eugene, Oregon has around 80 buildings and facilities, including athletics sites such as Hayward Field, which is the site for the 2008 Olympic Track and Field Trials, and McArthur Court, and off-campus sites such as nearby Autzen Stadium and the . Unlike professional athletes, who must retire before being elected to their respective sports' Hall of Fame, apparently there is no rule barring fossils that have made comebacks from becoming state fossils. Finally, DeTorrice notes that the Metasequoia is one of most common plant fossils in the state, which gives it an egalitarian flavor that befits a state with a decidedly egalitarian mindset mind·set or mind-set n. 1. A fixed mental attitude or disposition that predetermines a person's responses to and interpretations of situations. 2. An inclination or a habit. . In the surprising absence of competition by champions of other Oregon fossils - say, the beguiling Venericardia hornii, or the ever-popular Dentalium den·ta·li·um n. pl. den·ta·li·a or den·ta·li·ums Any of various tooth shells of the genus Dentalium. [New Latin Dent schencki - the Metasequoia seems a lovely and logical choice. |
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