Hell Creek Dino Bone?

[Andy]

Does this fossil look like a piece a dinosaur bone from the Hell Creek Formation of Montana? That's what I was told from the person I bought it from.

Thanks-

[Boesse]

That doesn't look like dinosaur bone at all, let alone bone from Hell Creek. Hell Creek bones are kind of a rich rusty brown color, and are usually in coarse, yellowish sandstones.

Usually one way to identify a chunk of bone is to look for trabeculae - trabeculae are the holes that you see on the inside of a bone. Most (99%) of bones have these (the exceptions being weird bones like baleen whale earbones, some sea cow bones, mosasaur quadrates, etc).

[Auspex]

I've seen some pretty gnarley chunks of dino bone, but the pics you posted look more crystaline than what I'm used to seeing.

[Andy]

It doesn't have any trabeculae or at least any that is obvious. It looks agatized with green agate. Could it be petrified wood? What could it be? I thought a saw a listing for dino bone on ebay and it had green agate like this piece has.

Thanks-

[Andy]

Note-It also has striations on the side characteristic of petrified wood or bone. My pictures are a little bit blurry, so they really don't show this off. The color of it is dark brown. But, there is some light brown clay attached to it.

Thanks-

[Andy]

It looks like bone on the outside, but on the inside it dosen't.