Hidden Gems: Visitors will dig Hudson-Meng's massive bison fossil excavation

Workers carefully excavate the bones of ancient bison at the Hudson-Meng Bison Kill Research & Visitor Center near Crawford, Neb./ U.S. FOREST SERVICE

Omaha is about 500 miles from Hudson-Meng. Norfolk and Grand Island are about 150 miles closer.

But no matter where you start from, you’ll end up about 10,000 years in the past when you visit the Hudson-Meng Bison Kill Research & Visitor Center northwest of Crawford, Neb. It is an archaeological excavation in progress.

Loy Nebergall of Omaha called to tell us about Hudson-­Meng, a hidden gem she has visited for years: “There are tons of bones out there.”

The bones of about 900 bison lie buried in an area the size of a football field. This now-extinct species resembled modern bison but was about 20 percent larger with horns that curved outward with a spread of 6 to 10 feet.

The ancient beasts died mysteriously as a group. Initially, as excavation began in the 1970s, it was thought they had been killed in one hunt. Later scientists raised theories of a mysterious mass kill, possibly by disease. Current thought points to wildfire, an ancient scourge that hit the area again last year. [...] Omaha.com