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I have been working hard lately on all of our programs and we are very close to having the dinosaur presentation I want us to have. We have a name for this program, Dinos Rock. Yes it is not super creative but for 2nd graders, this is a geology themed program. For 3rd graders, it is adaptation based but the name works. We have added some pieces that gives us more than a few teeth. Nothing museum quality or anything but a few bones help the visual factor. I have been studying the biology, geology and ecology of dinosaurs so the science will be good. my son is working on the art but we wont have any done soon, he has school projects a head of this. We are close to being ready a full 6 months before I thought we would be. Hell Creek was going to be a focus for us because the fossils are available and this is the fauna that most kids will recognize. If you are willing to look hard, you can also find some real bargains from this formation. We turned a lot of early attention collecting attention to Hell Creek dinosaurs and I am actually really happy with where we are at with the fossil material we have. There is a lot of room to add and maybe upgrade in the future but this is a good start. This is the famous T-Rex and Triceratops fauna and we started our collection with those critters. Very early on, we were able to get a few Hell CreekTriceratops teeth. I am very happy that through a purchase from TFF member, we added two frill pieces. They are Lance formation but we are not covering the Lance formation yet so they will be used here. I also added a frill piece from Hell Creek. The kids will get to touch the largest frill piece which is a great bonus. An iconic dinosaur and I think well represented. Also early on, we stumbled into a great bit of a luck. A TFF member saw a post of ours and passed it on to another TFF member who sold us a beautiful Tyrannosaurus Rex partial tooth and gave us a really nice Nano too. It was very affordable and a generous gift was added that gave us nice pieces from the most famous dinosaur ever. The rock star really. I was not sure we would be able to get a decent example at all but to do it right off the bat was HUGE. This would not have happened if not for the members that decided to help us out. We are extremely grateful The first dinosaur fossil we got were two Hell Creek Edmontosaurus teeth that were a gift. We acquired a nice jaw fragment in a trade. I am a bargain shopper with a limited budget so I LOVE our Edmontosaurus as it has not cost much at all. I named this display Eddie I like it so much lol Hadrosaurs are important dinosaurs to talk about and I think a fair amount of kids may not know about them. I would like to add another bone later too. They seem attainable for us. Acheroraptor was behind only T-rex on the my list and we got a really beautiful tooth and it was another bargain pick up. I will talk a lot about this species and I will get deep into the biology/ecology of this awesome dino because I love Dromaeosaurids. Raptors are also an iconic dinosaur that kids love and this is a relatively new species which is another fun thing to discuss with the kids. We will also be introducing the kids to a theropod they have never heard of, Richardoestesia gilmorei. I have told me son to envision a toothed Cormorant type dinosaur as I lean toward them being a fish eater. It is pretty cool to get a Hell Creek dino that they will not know anything about. We have yet to add a Thescelosaurus fossil but we will before we start presenting. I want to add another piece of the fauna and it seems this is the most inexpensive option we will have. It will also give the kids another dinosaur they probably do not know and it will round out the basic Hell Creek fauna. There is no shortage of dinosaurs that we can add either. An Anky or Nodosaur scute is way up on the program list of fossils for me and hopefully we can find one from this formation. Dakotaraptor is #1 on my personal list and I will get one eventually. A Troodontid is also very high on the list as well. I know eventually i will also pick up an Ornithominid too. All three of these are more expensive so we will have to save and wait but each one would also make awesome educational dinosaurs. I also really want to add an Avian fossil. I have not researched this but my guess is they are very rare. Leptoceratops is another species I would love to add at some point too. They are really cute and kids will dig them. Anyway, here are some of the fossils. I think we have a good start going to our Hell Creek collection and I am looking forward to taking these to work with me very soon. Pic 1- Triceratops teeth and Eddie Pic 2- T-Rex, Nano, and Hell's Thief. I am so happy to have these fossils. Pic 3- One of the frill pieces. This one will end up in a larger Trike display with more teeth and another frill. Plus we will have nice frill for kids to check out too.

This is a .35" theropod tooth from the Hell Creek formation, Carter County Montana. It is a really pretty little tooth for sure and it would look great in our Acheroraptor display. I believe I see the ridges that are diagnostic to that species, especially in the first picture. I wanted to run this by the forum to be sure I am seeing what I need to see though.

I thought I’d post some of my favorite claws from my collection. I’m curious what people think about my ID on one of them and I have no idea what the last one is. ID help with that one would be great! (All measurements are straight line) Spinosaurus hand claw 4 1/2” Kem Kem Beds, Morocco Repairs, but I see no restoration Acheroraptor Temerytorum foot walking claw 1 7/8” Hell Creek Carter County, Montana No repair or restoration (at first). However, the tip broke off during molding and it was lost. 1/16” restoration done to the tip now Two Acheroraptor killing claws. The larger one is 3 1/8” and the smaller is 1 9/16” Hell Creek Powder River County, Montana Large claw has restoration to the top 1/4” of the articulation end and 3/4” to the tip Smaller claw has restoration on 5/8” of the tip Same claw as above, with size perspective Other side... Acheroraptor Temertyorum digit I hallux claw 7/8” Hell Creek Slope County, North Dakota No repair or restoration Acheroraptor Temertyorum hand claw 1 1/4” Hell Creek Powder River County, Montana Restoration to 1/2” of the tip I originally thought this this was a Pachycephalosaurus claw, but Troodon’s posting on TFF makes me now believe it’s Thescelosaurus Hell Creek Powder River County, Montana No repair or restoration Side view.. Troodontid walking foot claw 1 1/16” Hell Creek Wibeaux County, Montana Looks like restoration to 1/4” of the tip Possible Microraptorine hand claw 5/8” Hell Creek Carter County, Montana Small amount of restoration to the top of the articulating end and 1/8” of the tip Same claw... Microraptorine killing claw. Related to Hesperonychus sp. 7/8” Hell Creek South Dakota Restoration to 3/16” of the tip Same claw for size comparison... Curious what people think of this one.. I believe it to be a Troodontid killing claw 3/4” Two Medicine Formation Unfortunately, no locality info on it Looks like the tip was glued back on, but no restoration Other side... Now I have no clue what this could be and I’d love some help. I bought it as a new collector awhile ago with very little knowledge. It was sold as a baby Anzu foot claw and the seller said Black Hills Museum ID’d it. I think it’s actually mammalian. Any thoughts? Size comparison Articulating end (sorry for the poor pics)

I recently added a Dromaeosaurid vertebra to our collection. I honestly did not bother with specs once I got it confirmed as Dromaeosaurid. I never asked size or what formation. I assumed it was from Judith River because it was sold as Dromaeosaurus. i knew it was going to be Dromaeosaurid indet so I was not worried about the specific ID. It is a raptor fossil so I wanted it. The vertebra arrived today and I got two very pleasant surprises. It is bigger than I thought. It is also not from Judith River or the species known from that formation. We got a Dromaeosaurid vertebra from the Hell Creek formation Many of our fossils end up being listed as a indet species. This one went into our official inventory as Dromaeosaurid indet. An indet species gives us some degree of latitude with our programs. I assign species to many of them such as Medusaceratops or Zuul from Judith River so that we can teach the kids dinosaurs they do not know about. When I first saw Hell Creek on the paperwork, I thought "Great, we have a vert to add to our Acheroraptor display which contains a single tooth." I began to think that I should assume it is from Acheroraptor because I had run across a published paper about a reconstruction of Dakotaraptor's tail. I thought it might be a good idea to reread that paper and see what information it provided. Our caudal vert is 5 cm long. Much to my surprise, that is right in the middle of the size range for a Dakotaraptor caudal vertebra according to the reconstruction (if I read the paper right). Now I am not saying this is a Dakotaraptor vertebra. I am nowhere near qualified to make that call. I also doubt I am lucky enough to find a fossil of that species by total accident lol I am also not qualified to say for sure that this is not a Dakotaraptor fossil. As an educator, this gives me a really awesome option. I am now considering that this may be an opportunity to add Dakotaraptor to our program with a fossil that MAY be from the giant raptor. Kids would dig that and it gives us the chance to talk about how the science, and art, of describing dinosaurs works. I think I am going to to print up the paper and give kids the information from it. They can see the fossil and come to their own conclusions. We do this with the lineage of Great White sharks. We show the kids teeth from a GW, a Meg, and a Hastalis. They can make their own conclusions though 80% of the kids the other day believed hastalis is the ancestor of the GW. It was a fun thing to do and it would work very well this fossil too. Dakotaraptor has been high on my list to add but I thought it would be down the road. I do not think there is any problem with introducing this fossil as possibly being from Dakotaraptor. Either way, we added an really cool fossil that I am super stoked about. Here is our Hell Creek Dromaeosaurid indet vert. Is it Acheroraptor or Dakotaraptor ? I am going to let the kids decide which awesome raptor this fossil is from.

Based on the numerous and informative posts of @Troodon, I feel pretty confident that this tooth is an Acheroraptor. It is from the Hell Creek formation, South Dakota. I saw some things that looked diagnostic and the seller provided pics that were pretty good. Anybody want to confirm the ID or present an alternative ?

I just got my large Acheroraptor temertyorum digit II-3 killing claw back from the restorer. He added the missing 1/4” back on to the top of the articulating end and added the missing 3/4” of the tip. The rest of the claw is complete, as it was found nearly whole. It’s one of my prized possessions and I am so happy with the restoration work. The claw was found in Powder River County, Montana’s Hell Creek Formation.

This is a fossil from the Cretaceous time period, it was found in the Hell creek formation. The specimen is a little under an inch long (tried to get a good picture of the serrations). I've done some research on the differences between the species I listed in the title and I've come short of being able to properly identify it (I'm only really a rookie fossil collector).