Wyoming Man Selling Massive 1-Ton Petrified Hollow Log For $20,000

Wyomingites covet their trees. They’re difficult to grow in much of the state, so people put a lot of effort into keeping their trees alive and thriving.

Then there’s Travis Smith of Glenrock, who doesn’t do anything to keep a centerpiece tree in his yard alive. That’s because his natural showstopper has been dead for a few million years.

And for $20,000, it can be yours.

Smith is selling the unique 1-ton hollowed-out log, listing the prehistoric piece of tree trunk simply as brown and in “new” condition.

While it’s an unusual yard ornament and a great talking point, it’s frankly just getting in the way, Smith said.

“All I do is complain about having to mow around it,” he told Cowboy State Daily.

The Family Tree

Smith said the petrified log in his yard isn’t just a huge chunk of pretty rock, it’s a family heirloom.

“It’s been handed down,” he said. “My grandfather worked for Glenrock Coal for 23 years. He saw it, and he liked it. So, they told him to take it home. They even loaned him a loader to haul to his house.”

Smith inherited the massive fossil from his mother, who moved it to her house from his grandfather’s. It’s moved multiple times over the years, and now Smith is ready to see it become another family’s tree.

That’s why he listed it on Facebook Marketplace.

“We’ve got different plans for the yard and whatnot,” he said. “We decided that somebody would probably love it a lot more than we do.”

The price for the log is $20,000, and Smith admits that’s scared a few people off, but it's every bit as hard as the tree.

“The right person is gladly going to pay that for it,” he said.

Missing The Forest For The Trees

Petrified wood can be found all over Wyoming, though it’s usually in small fragments rather than intact segments. However, finding sections of trunks and entire trees isn’t unheard of.

Jeanne Peterson and Robert Suchor were building a trailer park outside Buffalo when they found an entire forest of fossilized metasequoias, relatives of modern redwood trees. The largest one, which is over 35 feet long, has been kept intact.

“We started to find trees sticking out of the side of the hill,” Peterson told Cowboy State Daily. “Multiple trees. You could see branches on the surface. There’s petrified wood everywhere around us."

The BLM's Dry Creek Petrified Tree Environmental Education Area is only 2 miles from Peterson’s tree trunk. Those fossils are at least 60 million years old, from a time when Wyoming was more tropical than today.

Smith isn’t sure exactly what kind of tree he’s got in his yard, but it resembles and is certainly large enough to be a metasequoia. What makes it unusual is its hollow center, which isn’t typically seen in petrified trees.

As for the price, Smith said researched what monument and landscaping companies charge for petrified wood. For a piece as large and unique as his hollowed out segment, he believes $20,000 is a bargain.

“You don't see very many petrified hollow logs out there," he said. "If you do it by the pound, that's really not a very bad price."

Contact Andrew Rossi at arossi@cowboystatedaily.com

Andrew Rossi can be reached at arossi@cowboystatedaily.com.