Amateur Fossil Hunters Dig Real Thing : Dinosaurs: North Dakota volunteers work carefully to unearth a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton, entombed roughly 65 million years.

While millions pack air-conditioned theaters to watch fictional dinosaurs in “Jurassic Park,” amateur fossil hunters are braving the elements in North Dakota’s Badlands to find the real thing.

Merle Clark, 55, a rancher, and Dean Pearson, 36, a feed-mill operator, are part of a group of Bowman County volunteers working carefully to unearth a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton. They may be amateurs, but they’ve had special training and get guidance from paleontologists.

Only 13 other specimens of the meat-eating giant have been found. This particular Tyrannosaurus, which died about 65 million years ago, is entombed in part of the Hell Creek rock formation in North Dakota’s southwest corner. The adult Tyrannosaurus was usually 20 to 23 feet tall and 40 to 45 feet long.

The group began digging last fall, after Pearson found a single fossilized bone sticking out of a steep hillside. He took it to the Museum of the Rockies at Bozeman, Mont., to find out what it was.

“We thought we had a leg bone, but it was nothing like we’d ever seen,” Clark said.

He showed it to John Horner, a well-known paleontologist at the museum and a technical adviser to the hit movie “Jurassic Park.”

Horner “took one look at it and said ‘T-rex,’ ” Pearson said.

“Everybody’s pretty excited about it,” he added. “The stuff is pretty well-preserved.”

The desolate site, kept secret by the group, is surrounded by a snow fence and posted only with a sign warning “No Admittance.”

“We’re not trying to hide anything,” Pearson said. “We’re trying to preserve the security of the site and prevent damage.”

It’s hard to imagine anyone moseying by. The site is three-quarters of a mile off a little-used gravel road, shielded by the Badlands’ jagged buttes, towering hills and deep gullies.

“We’re assuming the site was not scavenged, but until we get more uncovered we won’t know for sure,” Pearson said.

The Denver Museum of Natural History and the North Dakota Geological Survey have been providing expert advice. Thirty-six residents have gone through hours of paleontology training on their own time.

Whatever bones are uncovered at the site are destined for the new Pioneer Trails Museum, a small volunteer-run operation in nearby Bowman with an annual budget of $750 and plenty of space for new exhibits.

Clark said about 15 volunteers make up the core of the group and others help when they can. No one is paid.

“A lot of people do it for money. There’s more to it than that,” said Laurie Oakland, who ranches and digs for fossils with her husband, Jeff.

“I enjoy it,” she said, her boots caked with a gooey clay known locally as “gumbo.”

“Something 65 million years old is in there and we’re going to be the first humans to see it.”

One recent day, eight volunteers worked 20 feet up a steep hillside to remove tons of dirt and clay and carve out a bone bed roughly 30 by 40 feet.

Wind and rain--from clouds so low they appeared within reach--pelted them, but they didn’t stop.

“You can’t hay when it’s raining, but you can sure dig a dinosaur; we’re living proof of that,” Clark said.

Some worried about lightning, but after a momentary pause for a clap of thunder they continued to work.

When the sky began to clear, someone remarked that they might be able to work until sunset, which comes around 9 p.m. this time of year.

Jurassic Park and the movie theater are far away.

“I haven’t seen it yet,” Oakland said.