Plastered on the tall metal cabinets in the museum's workroom are the imaginary dinosaur adventures of cartoon characters Calvin and Hobbes, but there's nothing imaginary about the adventures the employees are having there with real-life dinosaurs.

The Earth Science Museum, at the edge of the BYU campus, holds tons of life-size dinosaur replicas, skeletons carved out of hillsides and plaster casts wrapped around bones of some of the largest creatures that once roamed the earth.

Keith Kearl, a coordinator for the BYU football team, and his two children, Lauren and Jackson, visited the museum recently and found that sharp teeth are a common trait among some dinosaurs.

"This one has sharp teeth and claws," said Lauren Kearl, 6. "It must have been a meat eater with its sharp teeth."

Pointing at a mural of dinosaurs, Kearl taught his children about the Allosaurus on the mural as well as the skeleton model nearby.

"Can you imagine how huge it would be with meat and muscles on their bones?" Kearl asked his children. "Look at its shoulder blade, Jackson; it's way bigger than yours."

Allosaurus fragilis, a long, lanky creature with fierce-looking teeth, is the state dinosaur of Utah, only one of a handful of states that has an official state dinosaur.

Quantity is what earned the Allosaurus its spot in Utah's limelight: more than 40 Allosaurus specimens have been collected in the Cleveland -Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry south of Price.

"Jim Madsen, who worked the Cleveland-Lloyd Quarry, wrote the bible on allosaurs," said Rod Scheetz, Earth Science Museum curator. "He described them in great detail."

A massive two-ton body supported by long, muscular hind limbs, the allosaur displayed a long neck that held up a three-foot-long skull with curved teeth. Allosaurs used a slash-and-bleed technique on slower moving dinosaurs like stegosaurs and giant, long-necked sauropods. Once the prey collapsed from blood loss or died of infection, it was easy for the allosaur to move in and feed on the carcass, according to the Bowdoin and Geocities Web sites.

The large group of allosaur's bones from the Cleveland-Lloyd area were unearthed in a "bone bed" with the bones in pieces, Scheetz said.

"It appears as if it was a carnivore trap," he said. "It's believed that there might have been a sauropod out in a muddy area and the allosuars fed on it and got stuck. Then other allosaurs fed on those allosaurs."

In the best dinosaur finds, the animals are virtually intact, but others look more like a jigsaw puzzle.

"Every quarry we work is different," Scheetz said. "Some have bone bits and some have articulated [complete] animals."

Once a new dinosaur specimen is found, the pieces are collected in the field and brought to the museum where the bones are stabilized by gluing them together.

"When you are out on a site, you'll see just a piece above the ground," said Parker Valora, a junior studying geology, who spoke as he worked on the neck of a sauropod. "You dig around underneath and hope that it all pops out at once after you put a plaster jacket on it."

Back at the museum, the plaster jacket is removed and student workers sift through chunks of dirt and rock to find the bones of the dinosaur. Hammers, chisels and dental tools are used to help with the work.

"The most commonly used tools are called air scribes," said Brock Sisson, a student employee from Lehi, studying geology. "They are essentially mini-jackhammers that carefully remove the rock. A bit of skill is required to not hit and damage the bone but with a little practice it becomes easy."

BYU paleontologists then identify the bones by describing and comparing them to others. Bones are catalogued and housed in a large room recently added to the museum, which now allows for almost all BYU dinosaur specimens to be located together.

"The large collection room was just built," Scheetz said. "Some specimens were previously stored under the stadium and others are in the old Albertson's building."

Scheetz said there is excitement among paleontologists and workers when something new is found, and summed up his feelings about the work done in the museum.

"What better job is there than to get paid to work on dinosaurs?" Scheetz asked.

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*Earth Science Museum

Location: 1683 North Canyon Road (across from stadium)

Hours: 9a.m. - 5 p.m.

Admission: Free

Tours can be arranged by calling 422-3680