Petrified Forest Field Institute 1-Day Paleontology Digs

Join a 1-day program on either June 14 or Aug 9, 2025 where you’ll start the day with a behind the scenes tour of the park fossil collections and then be driven ‘off the beaten’ path to work for about five hours at the research quarry and dig site. While there, participants will work closely with park paleontology crew to learn to identify fossils from rock and carefully excavate specimens. This is a real-life adventure where participants participate in a real paleontological dig. That means you’ll be working on your hands and knees in the dirt using light hand tools and brushes, but there is no heavy digging or lifting. Depending on what the day turns up, you could be casting fossils to carry out using plaster and burlap.