Using QTVR to Document and Visit Research Areas
Pulaski Cave
Recently, paleontologists from the Illinois State Museum (ISM) and
Northern Arizona University (NAU) along with cavers from central
Missouri and eastern Iowa visited a cave in central Missouri to
examine paleontological material (bones and teeth) that are in the
cave. They knew that the cave contained bones, because bones had
been collected from the cave during the 1960s under the direction of
Dr. Oscar Hawksley of Central Missouri State University. The
collection, which is now housed at the Illinois State Museum, includes
the remains of hundreds of animals. Some of the animal recovered
are extinct, such as peccaries, dire wolves, and short-faced bear.
Others are still alive but no longer occur in Missouri, these include
yellow-cheeked voles, fishers, and snowshoe hares. Still other animals
recovered are ones that still occur in Missouri today
including eastern woodrats, coyotes, and gray bats. The bones got into
the cave over 20,000 years ago.