Sue thunders into winter fest

Got a dinosaur-mad or stir-crazy kid?

Kill two birds with one stone at "Winter Wonderland" from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. today at Peck Farm Park, 38W199 Kaneville Road, Geneva.

You can wonder what Sue, a dinosaur, ate for dinner with those massive jaws, as a reproduction of the skull of the Tyrannosaurus rex will be in the orientation barn, on loan from the Field Museum.

Scientists estimate the dinosaur would have stood 13 feet high at the hips, and was 42 feet long from head to tail tip. Her -- or his -- jaws opened about 4 feet wide.

"I just thought she'd be cool," said Becky Lambert, superintendent of natural areas and interpretation for the Geneva Park District. "You can get right up next to it."

The remains were found in 1990 on an Indian reservation in South Dakota. The dinosaur is named for the fossil explorer who discovered it; the sex is unknown.

Besides the replica of the head, young visitors can pretend they are digging for bones and fossils in a sand table marked off in grids, just like archaeologists and paleontologists do.

There are skulls of small animals, many found at Peck Farm Park, that they can examined to determine what that animal ate. There's also a short movie about the dinosaur and more.

It ties in with the mural in the observation silo, which depicts what the area might have looked like in various ages, starting when mammoths roamed the area and proceeding to when the Peck Family ran a sheep farm.

Mammoths' skeletons have been found in northern Illinois, including Aurora. No dinosaur skeletons have been found, however. Lambert said the area's freeze-thaw cycle might have reduced to dust any bones from their time period. Sue was protected in sandstone.

"Maybe if we dig deep enough we might find something," Lambert said.

Dinosaur exhibit

• The exhibit runs through Feb. 25. The park is open Monday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

• The exhibit asks for a $1 donation.

• Call (630) 262-8244.