Utah Museum displays animated r- ice age mammals ' - " . , - ' - Y, - ... . , - , ; . ; i i i " ' k f " J P ' ' ' 1 I r i & ' 1 SALT LAKE CITY-Research work open to public view on the famous "Huntington Mammoth' and animated reconstructions of giant ice age mammals are highlights of an exposition showing throughout the summer at the Utah Museum of Natural History. "Everyone in Utah has a stake in the information the Huntington Mammoth is revealing about life in Utah 12,000 years ago," said Donald V. Hague, director of the museum on the University of Utah campus. 'It, the other exhibits in our Ice Age Discovery Room and the Dinamation animals provide a first-hand feeling for the Pleistocene period, which had so much to do with shaping the Utah we know today." The animated creatures, made by the Dinamation Company, are similar simi-lar to the life-size dinosaurs that attracted at-tracted 350,000 visitors to the museum mu-seum two years ago. Simulated fur and skin combine with computer-controlled computer-controlled movements and sounds to give a realistic impression of how the animals must have appeared when they lived more than 10,000 years ago. Life-size replicas in the exhibit include a 10-foot sabre-toothed cat, an 18-foot giant sloth with baby,and a 12-foot Doedicurus, an armadillo-life armadillo-life animal that weighed two tons. The centerpiece is a half-size woolly wool-ly mammoth (with its baby), an elephant species that lived near the edge of the northern glaciers and had tusks up to 12 feet long. An addition to the exhibit is a rhino-like Eobasileus, which was a dominant form in the age of mammals. It lived in what is now the Uinta Basin between 38 and 55 million years ago. Hague said the work on the Huntington Hun-tington Mammoth is the actual preparation and casting of the fossil bones. "We placed it on view so the public can observe the work in progress and converse with museum mu-seum staff about the specimen,' he said. "When funding is available, other institutions in Utah will be provided with casts of the bones." The Huntingon Mammoth was excavated by the U.S. Forest Service, Ser-vice, Utah Division of State History and a consortium of other institutions institu-tions and individual volunteers in 1988 after it was discovered during construction of the Huntington reservoir re-servoir in Sanpete County. It is one of the most complete specimens of Columbian Mammoth ever found and is unusual in that mammoths were not thought to have lived at the 9,000-foot elevation. eleva-tion. Much can be learned from these materials because mammoth bones were found with human-made tools, the remains of a giant bear, and other plant and animal fossils. The specimen could yield more information informa-tion on Ice Age life than any other, added Hague. The Ice Age Discovery Room also contains a simulated excavation excava-tion where children can experience paleontology first-hand. A sequence se-quence of exhibits explains the effects the ice ages and Lake Bonneville Bon-neville had on Utah. The museum's permanent Janke This Sabor Toothed Cat is one of the many animated ice age mammals on display at the Utah Museum of Natural History. Kolff Fossil Mammal Exhibit includes in-cludes mounted skeletons of a mastodon, sabre-toothed cat, dire wolf, giant beaver, giant bison and other animals. These remains help scientists to understand the characteristics of long-vanished species. The museum of Natural History is located at the Second South Street entrance to the University of Utah campus. Showing through Sept. 23, the Dinamation exhibit carries a special admission fee at the door of $3.50 for adults and $2 for children. Hours are 9:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday, 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, and noon to 5 p.m. Sunday and holidays.