And here we are...back where it all started. Before we let you go, we'll just point out a few more things we have lying about our Courtyard.

Check out the dinosaur footprint. It is actually a cast of a footprint...like if you walked in the sand at the beach, then filled your footprint with plaster of paris (because let's face it...we all walk around on the beach with a bag of plaster of paris), let it dry, and dug it up - the plaster of paris is the"cast," while the footprint in the sand is the "mold." Based on the size of the print, and the splay and shape of the toes (broad toes, wide angle between each), our dinosaur was likely to have been an herbivorous dino...maybe an ornithopod...maybe even a duckbill!

And if you're curious about what sort of vegetation was around during the time of the dinosaurs, we've got some good examples right here on campus: Cycads outside of Robbins Hall, along the S&W sides; these plants pre-date dinosaurs by a couple hundred million years. Ginkgos in front of Bainer. Equisetum on the NE side of bridge crossing the north end of Spafford Lake; these also pre-date dinos by a couple hundred million years. Ferns and conifers grow along Putah Creek. And last but not least, you can find Magnolias all over campus. When you find the one on the Quad, turn around & look at the curved section of Shields Library. At 40' tall, it’s the height of a Brachiosaurus!

The big kitty in the corner of the Courtyard (in the cat box...oh, it's just too much fun here!) is the California State Fossil, Smilodon californicus. This skeleton is a poly resin cast of an actual specimen from the Rancho La Brea tarpits in California. Smilodon lived during the Pleistocene epoch, from about 1.8 million years ago to 10,000 years before the present.This was long after the dinosaurs went extinct. Saber-tooth cats lived when wooly mammoths and mastodons roamed much of North America, including the area surrounding Davis.