Akal Wood Fossil Park

Akal Wood Fossil Park lies about 17 km from Jaisalmer and covers 21 hectares. It protects the fossilised remains of a forest that grew here some 180 million years ago, in the Jurassic period, when the climate was hot and humid. Because of its geological importance the site has been declared a Biodiversity Heritage Site.

The forest was later covered by the sea, and fossil gastropod shells, shell-marked rocks and river sediments record that change. A petrified trunk of an extinct gymnosperm stands at the entrance, and about a dozen fossil logs lie across the ground in different sizes and directions, the longest 13.4 m long and 0.9 m wide. Plant fossils such as Pterophyllum, Ptilophyllum and Equisetites are displayed, and thatched mud huts hold dinosaur teeth, bones and labelled specimens. A small lake in the park draws migratory birds in winter.