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Mosasaur jaws are one of the fossils that are very commonly available in the market, which can be suitable for novice collectors with moderate budget to get their hands on but also can be quite risky due to the many fakes, composites and restored specimens flooding the market. But they are still one of my favorite creatures that fascinate me to collect and study them as much as I can. I think I can pretty much tell a completely faked or composited specimens from the restored and genuine ones from looking at the differences in teeth on the jaw (using different species teeth to make a fake jaw) or how the jaws are unnaturally formed with lack of bone texture details. But when we look at restored specimens that probably used real mosasaur jaw it becomes much harder for me (and probably many others) to tell how good the restoration workmanship is, how much has been restored or how much materials are composite - at least on the more "natural-looking" specimens that are in a different price league than the common "composites & fakes" that you see all the time in the market. So I am wondering how the experts are able to tell which one has a better workmanship? For example this one: From what I gathered (and partly guess) this one is a restored specimen using real jaw piece from an actual mosasaur with some teeth replacement and refitting for decorative purposes. I can see the jaw bone seem to have bone grain and texture that looks authentic and to my knowledge, a composite made from grounded mosasaur bone and matrix wouldn't display this kind of feature, am I wrong? How would the experts weigh in on this specimen? And how does this specimen compare to another specimen (pictures in following post, since I ran out of upload limit for the original post) in terms workmanship and authentic feel for a restored mosasaur jaw? ……….