The Danger Still Lurks
We leave Rancho La Brea just as we entered, with a view of an entrapped Columbian mammoth struggling to escape the sticky trap of an asphalt seep. Thankfully it was mostly these prehistoric Ice Age animals that became mired in the pits and not the rest of us. But the seeps remain dangerous to the unwary. A year earlier a goo-covered young female fox squirrel narrowly avoided the fate of so many mastodons and saber-toothed cats eons before, when it was rescued from the La Brea Tar Pits. She went under, managed to pop back to the surface and then was lifted out with a stick. Following transport to The California Wildlife Center near Malibu, the rescue operation involved lots of soapy water and patient interns scrubbing the squirrel's face and fur with toothbrushes. After untold buckets of water and nearly one hour later, the tar was cleaned off. The California Wildlife Center kept the squirrel for two weeks to make sure she didn't grow ill from her dunking and then released her back on the tar pit grounds, presumably the wiser.
Read a news account of it here.
See a video of the scrubbing here.
And here are some pictures of a man who had to be plucked from the tar after rescuing a dog in 1951.
The Danger Still Lurks
We leave Rancho La Brea just as we entered, with a view of an entrapped Columbian mammoth struggling to escape the sticky trap of an asphalt seep. Thankfully it was mostly these prehistoric Ice Age animals that became mired in the pits and not the rest of us. But the seeps remain dangerous to the unwary. A year earlier a goo-covered young female fox squirrel narrowly avoided the fate of so many mastodons and saber-toothed cats eons before, when it was rescued from the La Brea Tar Pits. She went under, managed to pop back to the surface and then was lifted out with a stick. Following transport to The California Wildlife Center near Malibu, the rescue operation involved lots of soapy water and patient interns scrubbing the squirrel's face and fur with toothbrushes. After untold buckets of water and nearly one hour later, the tar was cleaned off. The California Wildlife Center kept the squirrel for two weeks to make sure she didn't grow ill from her dunking and then released her back on the tar pit grounds, presumably the wiser.
Read a news account of it here.
See a video of the scrubbing here.
And here are some pictures of a man who had to be plucked from the tar after rescuing a dog in 1951.