Dinosaur Encounters
General Admission: begins March 7
Friday, 10:30 and 11:30 am
Saturday and Sunday, 11 am and 1:45 pm
*Schedule varies. Please visit ticket checkout for available times.
Date
Member Preview: February 28 and March 1
General Admission: begins March 7
Friday, 10:30 and 11:30 am
Saturday and Sunday, 11 am and 1:45 pm
*Schedule varies. Please visit ticket checkout for available times.
Location
Tickets
$10 per person. General Admission also required.
Member Preview tickets available now. General Admission tickets available February 25.
Free for Members. Reservation required.
Members, make sure to log in to your Member Portal to book your Member Preview tickets.
Dinosaur Encounters returns with four new puppets and a refreshed storyline, which follows paleontologists at a remote dig site where fossil bones transform into dinosaurs right before your very eyes!
Join us on an adventurous journey, set between the Utah Badlands and Los Angeles at the Natural History Museum, where playful dinosaurs come to life in an exciting live puppet performance featuring Gnatalie, the long-necked sauropod; Hunter, a Juvenile T. rex; Auggie, a duck-billed hadrosaur; and a new puppet inspired by the Museum’s iconic Dueling Dinos fossils – all under the watchful presence of a mischievous swarm of gnats and a sauropodomorph jester.
Dinosaur Encounters is family-friendly and approximately 23 minutes long. ADA accommodations available. Please inquire with an associate upon arrival.
Meet our Dinosaurs
SAUROPODOMORPH
The show's spirited emcee and resident know-it-all is a miniature long-necked dinosaur who helps guide audiences through the story with curiosity and humor.
AUGGIE
Short for Augustynolophus morrisi, Auggie represents California's official state dinosaur! With realistic features, Auggie the puppet is a smaller-scale version of the Cretaceous-period herbivore that lived around 66 million years ago, and could grow as long as a school bus.
The only two known fossil specimens of Augustynolophus in the world reside at NHM and can be seen on the upper deck of our Dinosaur Hall.
GNATALIE
Gnatalie is a long-necked dinosaur puppet inspired by the world’s first discovered green-hued, 75-foot sauropod, now on view in the new NHM Commons' Welcome Center. Gnatalie is affectionately nicknamed for the stinging gnats that pestered excavators during excavation of the real-life fossil.
HUNTER
Hunter is a life-like, full-body puppet, based on the juvenile specimen in the T. rex growth series on view in the Dinosaur Hall.
Hunter is covered in “proto-feathers,” reflecting current hypotheses that dinosaurs and birds share a common ancestor, and that juvenile T. rex may have had downy feathers to keep warm. As an apex predator, Hunter is always on the lookout for a good meal.
FOSSIL HUNTER AND BONE-KOTA
Fossil Hunter and Bone-Kota are one-of-a kind, all-bones puppets, based on the T. rex and Triceratops Dueling Dinos in our Grand Foyer, offering a playful look at dinosaur anatomy.
*Please note: these are not small hand puppets. The Museum's puppets are large, realistic interpretations of wild animals. Please prepare small children accordingly.
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