280 Million-year-old Tree Donated to the Smithsonian

There's a new addition to the collections at the Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C. The University of Iowa has donated a 280 million-year-old, 16 ton fossilized tree to the museum, because the building they were being held in is going to be demolished. It took painstaking effort and $15,000 to move the "scale tree" across the country, to be worked on and displayed in 5-10 years.

I first saw this on Fox 5 news, so I looked it up. On the news, they said they were going to separate the fossil into pieces, because of it's large size. In the article below, Pete Kroehler said they will remove 10 tons of "excess rock". I can see taking some of the rock off if it's there, but I don't support it if they're breaking the fossil up.

In fact, I don't really support the move to Washington DC. It's nice to have it in our area, but University of Iowa professor Jeff Schabilion said, "My original intent was to keep it in Iowa because it's part of our natural history." Something like this should be enjoyed and studied by the people of Iowa. Am I to believe that there's not one museum in Iowa that wanted something like this? I'm sure the transportation costs would've been cheaper as well.

But, it's here, and I guess it'll be here awhile. I look forward to seeing it on a future visit to the Smithsonian.

Des Moines Register article:
http://desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050604/NEWS08/506040361/1010/NEWS08