Are dinosaur discoveries just tip of iceberg?

As news of a remarkably well-preserved cache of dinosaur bones was being heralded in media outlets around the world, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management paleontologist who had announced the find was taking a breath and urging others to do the same.

No new species were turned up at the 3-month-old site, although a lot of digging is yet to be done. It is within the same Utah/Colorado border region where at least two previously unheard-of dinosaur species were discovered during the past 10 years. Scientists also do not know whether there are helpful data in the bones or if the find is just a nice stone snapshot of the animals whose lives ended there.

Scott Foss believes further digging will reveal a tip of the iceberg of information that will help solve the ongoing mystery of how dinosaurs grew and lived prior to being driven extinct.

For lay dinosaur enthusiasts, the site is already being described in blogs and e-mails as "a major find," just by virtue of the contents being so legible. Foss and other scientists say they can't help but have their expectations raised by the fossil bones of four long-necked sauropods — the plant-eating dinosaurs that were likely the largest creatures that ever have or ever will walk the earth.

There are also two carnivorous dinosaurs and possibly a modern-day favorite among dinosaurs — a stegosaurus. Nearby, there are animal burrows and petrified tree trunks 6 feet in diameter. Some have their bark still attached. They are among the best-preserved specimens ever found.

New dinosaur finds always create a buzz, especially such discoveries as the rotund, sickle-clawed Falcarius utahensis, which gave Utah its name-brand fossil and the movie "Jurassic Park" its most feared villain — one that relentlessly stalks its human prey through a modern stainless steel kitchen.

The latest find is in the same area that yielded the first allosaur fossils — the Morrison formation, and that alone all but ensures the 50-by-200-yard site's evolution into full-fledged quarry. The Western Illinois University group that made the discovery is already calling it that.

It's a given to Western Illinois University paleontologist Matthew Bonnan that the site will not only become as famous and integral to putting together ancient history as Dinosaur National Monument. "It's the first time in a long time where we have logjams of bones of different species in one place," he said.