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Apr 28, 2024 · La Brea Tar Pits, tar (Spanish brea) pits, in Hancock Park (Rancho La Brea), Los Angeles, California, U.S. The area was the site of “pitch springs” oozing crude oil that was used by local Indians for waterproofing. Gaspar de Portolá’s expedition in 1769 explored the area, which encompasses about 20.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Small tar pit. The La Brea Tar Pits is an active paleontological research site in urban Los Angeles. Hancock Park was formed around a group of tar pits where natural asphalt (also called asphaltum, bitumen, or pitch; brea in Spanish) has seeped up from the ground for tens of thousands of years.
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La Brea Tar Pits Map. Project 23: Newest Activity Dig — Our excavators are working here seven days a week! Pit 9 : We think this is the oldest excavation site. Thirty individual mammoths were found here in 1914. Pit 91: This is the most excavated pit in the park! Come check out the live excavators here.
- Not Tar... Asphalt. Asphalt bubbling up from below ground at the La Brea Tar Pits pond. Los Angeles Almanac Photo. To be clear: the La Brea Tar Pits are not actually composed of tar at all.
- Only A Few Inches Deep. Smilodon californicus (Saber-Tooth Cat) and Canis dirus (Dire Wolf) fight over a Mammuthus columbi (Columbian Mammoth) carcass in the La Brea Tar Pits.
- Asphalt is an Amazing Preservative. La Brea Tar Pits lab worker cleans asphalt from a 40,000-year-old bison bone. Los Angeles Almanac Photo. Asphalt is not easily removed from fossil remains, as La Brea Tar Pits paleontologists can tell you, but skeletal remains encased in it are kept in pristine condition.
- No Dinosaur Fossils... Ice Age Fossils. Mural portraying Ice Age Los Angeles at La Brea Tar Pits & Museum. Los Angeles Almanac Photo. Fossils found in the La Brea Tar Pits only date from the very end of the Pleistocene epoch (also known as the Ice Ages), from 11,700 to 50,000 years ago, which still falls within our current Cenozoic Era.
History of the La Brea Tar Pits. What was Los Angeles like 11,000 years ago?
La Brea Tar Pits: Exploring the Unqiue History of Los Angeles. I often forget about LA’s unique history when I drive through the massive skyscrapers that make up this concrete jungle, but at one point in time, massive creatures walked this land and even managed to get caught and preserved in the La Brea Tar Pits.
Get Stuck In the Tar Pits. Make no bones about it, La Brea Tar Pits is integral to the history of Los Angeles. Asphalt mined from the Tar Pits was used to pave L.A.’s streets, and excavations have been underway for more than one hundred years.
