Employees from the Philip J. Currie Museum (Wembley, Alberta, Canada) have safely eliminated an enormous Pachyrhinosaurus lakustai fossil cranium from the Pipestone Creek Bonebed. The specimen nicknamed “Huge Sam” is estimated to weigh round 2 hundred and seventy kilograms (600 kilos). The well-known Pipestone Creek web site is without doubt one of the densest dinosaur fossil deposits recognized. The stays of a whole bunch of horned dinosaurs (P. lakustai) have been excavated. Elements of the location have round 300 particular person fossils per sq. metre. “Huge Sam” is the primary full cranium to have been discovered on the web site for greater than a decade,
“Huge Sam” the Pachyrhinosaurus lakustai cranium wrapped in plaster and burlap. Image credit score: Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum.
Image credit score: The Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum
The Pipestone Creek Bonebed
The Pipestone Creek bonebed deposits represent a part of the Wapiti Formation. These strata have been laid down throughout the Late Cretaceous. This outstanding web site has yielded an distinctive fauna dominated by plentiful stays of the centrosaurine ceratopsian Pachyrhinosaurus. Nevertheless, Lambeosaurus and Edmontosaurus together with ankylosaurs and theropods have additionally been recorded from the Wapiti Formation. The Pachyrhinosaurus cranium measures over a metre in size. It is without doubt one of the largest ceratopsid skulls to have been present in northern Alberta.
Digging away on the underlying sediment to arrange “Huge Sam” for flipping previous to extraction. Image credit score: Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum.
Image credit score: The Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum
The fossil cranium is preserved upside-down and with its head frill nonetheless connected, a preservation occasion that has not beforehand been documented. A area crew from the Phillip J. Currie Museum have spent the final two summers meticulously mapping, excavating and jacketing the cranium prepared for transporting away from the quarry.
Inspecting the underside of the Pachyrhinosaurus lakustai cranium jacket as “Huge Sam” is ready for transport. Image credit score: Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum.
Image credit score: The Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum
Pachyrhinosaurus lakustai
Pachyrhinosaurus lakustai is one in every of three Pachyrhinosaurus species which were named. It’s the geologically oldest species, having lived round 73 million years in the past (Campanian stage of the Late Cretaceous). This species was formally named and described in 2008 (Currie, Langston and Tanke).
Pachyrhinosaurus was a smaller, older cousin of the Triceratops, with a giant, bony protrusion on its nostril as a substitute of a nostril horn.
The Haolonggood Pachyrhinosaurus dinosaur mannequin (LvFang) photographed within the studio. Image credit score: Every little thing Dinosaur.
Image credit score: Every little thing Dinosaur
Dr Emily Bamforth, the curator on the Philip J. Currie Museum commented in an e mail despatched to Every little thing Dinosaur:
“We have been very excited to lastly have ‘Huge Sam’, the cranium of a Pachyrhinosaurus lakustai we not too long ago gather from the Pipestone Creek Bonebed, protected in our lab! I seen that you just do carry two fashions of P. lakustai, which is superior. We truly use the Haolonggood Pachyrhinosaurus and Edmontosaurus for our outreach and schooling programmes right here.”
To view the vary of Haolonggood prehistoric animal figures in inventory: Haolonggood Dinosaur Fashions.
Extracting the Fossil Cranium
As soon as the 300 or so different bones had been fastidiously faraway from the encompassing space, the Museum crew started the method of turning the jacketed fossil over and securing it prepared for its journey away from the dig web site.
“Huge Sam” is fastidiously winched onto a trolley for transport away from the quarry. Image credit score: Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum.
Image credit score: The Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum
The large block was slowly however certainly winched up onto a trolley in order that workers and volunteers might take this essential fossil discovery to the preparation laboratory on the museum. Laboratory technicians will then start the laborious means of eradicating the fossil bones from the matrix permitting “Huge Sam” to be seen in its glory.
Workforce members fastidiously escort the Pachyrhinosaurus cranium fossil away from the quarry. The fossil will spend many months within the preparation lab being cleaned and ready. Image credit score: Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum.
Image credit score: The Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum
Members of the general public can go to and see the cranium present process cleansing and preparation. The target is to finally put this outstanding fossil specimen on show.
Every little thing Dinosaur acknowledges the help of a media launch from the Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum within the compilation of this text.