Badlands Its Life and Landscape Author:Joy Keve Hauk The Big Badlands of South Dakota, or the White River Badlands as they are also called, lie chiefly in the southwestern quarter of the State in the drainages of the White, Bad and Cheyenne Rivers. This area teems with jagged peaks that are ribbed with rock layers of varying hardness and fluted with tiny gullies carved by rain. — This region is fam... more »ous as a classic example of badlands formations. Here a great wealth of readily available knowledge of earth formations, extinct species, and workings of erosion has accumulated. Scientists have discovered abundant evidence of mammal life that lived in this region between 25 and 35 million years ago, a time span called the Oligocene Epoch. More than 250 species of mammalian fossils from the Badlands have been described in scientific reports, making the area on of the best places in the world to study animal life of the Oligocene time.
That portion of the Badlands known as Badlands National Monument is a refuge for many kinds of animals that are found in the northern Great Plains. Its grasslands, used only by wildlife, will give you a vivid idea and feeling of how this area appeared before the first European explorations. This booklet is intended to help you know and understand this fascinating area.« less