Montana Dinosaur Center
A working paleontology center pairs research collections and a vast model display with field programs in one of Montana’s richest fossil regions.
Artwork inspired by Frances Senska
The Montana Dinosaur Center is a working paleontology organization, not simply a room of finished skeletons. Museum exhibits and the preparation lab connect fossils from the Two Medicine Formation to the slower scientific work of identification, comparison, conservation, and research; the enormous skeletal model supplies scale, but the process is the real subject.
Field programs are separate experiences with separate time, cost, terrain, and booking demands. A half-day emphasizes prospecting, mapping, geology, and identification, while a full day can add active excavation and lunch. Participants assist real research and do not keep fossils, which remain in the scientific collection.
- Setting
- Two Medicine Formation fossil country
- Museum visit
- About 1–2 hours
- Admission
- $6 adult; $4 ages 4–12
Quick guide
- In the museum
- Trace fossil discovery through preparation
- In the field
- Choose prospecting or excavation deliberately
Follow a fossil from ground to evidence
- Geology
- Begin with the Two Medicine Formation so each fossil has an environmental and chronological setting.
- Preparation
- Watch how material is stabilized, cleaned, labeled, and compared rather than jumping only to complete skeletons.
- Scale
- Use the large skeletal model to understand anatomy and proportion, not as a substitute for the real specimens and research.
- Fieldwork
- Match the program to mobility, heat tolerance, time, and expectations; every fossil stays with the research collection.
Good to know
Public digs run June 1–Aug 31, with active excavation generally best from mid-June through August. Participants cannot keep fossils, and non-digging companions still pay because they occupy limited van capacity.
Notice these
- Two Medicine fossils
- Working preparation lab
- Research field programs