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Tooth And Bone Pathologies


Harry Pristis

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In my estimation, tooth and bone pathologies are not attractive -- they lack the functionality, the smooth lines, and symmetry that is admirable in normal teeth and bones. Yet, these pathologies speak to me of the struggles and sometimes pain of those long-dead animals.

This one is from a large Late Eocene shark that prowled the shallow carbonate platform that was Florida at the time (~39 Ma). This shark suffered some injury to at least one tooth whorl in it's jaw. This injury affected the germ teeth and resulted in this (and others, unfound) deformed tooth.

I hope other subscribers here will post some of their tooth and bone pathologies.

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http://pristis.wix.com/the-demijohn-page

 

What seest thou else

In the dark backward and abysm of time?

---Shakespeare, The Tempest

 

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Great topic! I always love pathologic teeth :D and showing them off.

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I'm guessing you were inspired by Auspexs' ebay post earlier, perhaps :D

Is the tooth in the picture yours Harry??? Either way it's really awesome!

The soul of a Fossil Hunter is one that is seeking, always.

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Unlike Harry, I love pathologic teeth; something about each one's unique ugliness. I've posted these before, but here they are again, a Great White, an auriculatus and 3 views of my most messed up Otodus

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There's no limit to what you can accomplish when you're supposed to be doing something else

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Great topic! I always love pathologic teeth :D and showing them off.

I'm guessing you were inspired by Auspexs' ebay post earlier, perhaps :D

Is the tooth in the picture yours Harry??? Either way it's really awesome!

Yes, Phoenixflood, I was inspired by the eBay tooth. I have a backlog of fossils to photograph, and this tooth was among them. I overcame my inertia thanks to Auspex. The tooth will go back into my drawer -- glad you appreciate it. And, I can see that you do appreciate pathological examples from your own splendid collection.

Unlike Harry, I love pathologic teeth; something about each one's unique ugliness. I've posted these before, but here they are again, a Great White, an auriculatus and 3 views of my most messed up Otodus.

Well, I don't dislike pathological teeth; they just speak to me in a different voice. Unique ugliness? . . . you must really love that Otodus tooth! LOL That may be the most loveable tooth ever!

Thanks for sharing the images.

http://pristis.wix.com/the-demijohn-page

 

What seest thou else

In the dark backward and abysm of time?

---Shakespeare, The Tempest

 

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Yes, I will not pass up the opportunity to collect pathologic teeth, at least those that I find on my own. :D Yeah, I think you're right there is unique ugliness that one tends to find attractive. I guess it's the fact that they are not as common as regular teeth that appeals to me. The and the rarer the tooth with the pathology the better :D

So that is your tooth: Everyone of your photos looks picture perfect. I think it's also the labels. A lot of the time I think you're pulling it out of a journal or something, I didn't realize it was actually your fossils. That's great!

The soul of a Fossil Hunter is one that is seeking, always.

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Yes, I like odd teeth too. I posted this awhile back, and

an expert I emailed it too thought a pebble or something

had attached itself but he only saw a picture, and in person,

it is one thing. Either way, I love the tooth...

Enjoy seeing the odd ones too..

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Welcome to the forum!

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Yes, I like odd teeth too. I posted this awhile back, and

an expert I emailed it too thought a pebble or something

had attached itself but he only saw a picture, and in person,

it is one thing. Either way, I love the tooth...

Enjoy seeing the odd ones too..

That, too, is a loveable tooth, 'Roz'. :)

How about the bones with pathologies? Those are the fossils that speak to me of pain and the will to survive. Here's a 'gator metapodial with a nasty bone infection. Don't know that this infection spelled his doom (unless it spread elsewhere in his body), but it would have made him mighty cranky.

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http://pristis.wix.com/the-demijohn-page

 

What seest thou else

In the dark backward and abysm of time?

---Shakespeare, The Tempest

 

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I am going to have to look through all my

fossilized bone, not that I have that much, but

didn't realize that is what the result of a bone

infection would look like. If I found it, I would

have assumed that it either broke off after

death or it was the bite of something.

Yes, must have been horribly painful.

Welcome to the forum!

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I don't have any bone, but I did miss a couple more teeth.

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There's no limit to what you can accomplish when you're supposed to be doing something else

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About many teeth do you find before you find an

oddball? Just curious....

Thousands :D seriously. I have 4 wine sized bottled full of tiny teeth

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+ a number of larger teeth over the years but I have only those pathological teeth that I posted :(

The soul of a Fossil Hunter is one that is seeking, always.

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Wow, I figured they were rare but maybe more rare than I thought.....

Of course it is nice to find those thousands too!

Welcome to the forum!

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Yes, it is nice :D I can only speak for my personal experience on how rare pathological teeth are. I'd like to know what everyone else thinks the frequency is for finding pathological teeth.

I'll save Tracer a joke and say 104.3 patho-oldies :D

The soul of a Fossil Hunter is one that is seeking, always.

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When I first found this fossil bone it was covered in algae. It seemed familiar and strange. But, when I cleaned it up, I realized I'd found two fused mosasaur caudal vertebrae. It's one of my favorites.

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The human mind has the ability to believe anything is true.  -  JJ

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well, i've just been trying to think what the psychological ramifications are of being interesting in pathological things.

lessee, um.. "psycho" + "patho" = "psychopath"? O!

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p.s. - dang, john! you washed off some cool algae we could have oogled just to get to a coupla fused mosasaur verts? sheesh.

probably sort of wagged his tail like ed sullivan woulda. poor little mosey. i love mosasaurs. bet they were just cute as buttons.

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Thousands :D seriously. I have 4 wine sized bottled full of tiny teeth

+ a number of larger teeth over the years but I have only those pathological teeth that I posted :(

I think that frequency is in the ballpark . . . hundreds-to-one, at least.

When I first found this fossil bone it was covered in algae. It seemed familiar and strange. But, when I cleaned it up, I realized I'd found two fused mosasaur caudal vertebrae. It's one of my favorites.

Cool vertebrae! I had a chiropractor-customer who wanted any pathological vertebrae I could provide.

http://pristis.wix.com/the-demijohn-page

 

What seest thou else

In the dark backward and abysm of time?

---Shakespeare, The Tempest

 

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When I first found this fossil bone it was covered in algae. It seemed familiar and strange. But, when I cleaned it up, I realized I'd found two fused mosasaur caudal vertebrae. It's one of my favorites.

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Now that is 1 cool vert!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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i looked at the verts again. they're really starting to grow on me. which of tj's things could i trade for them?

you know, if critter's whole vertebral column was like that, he was a spearosaur. his buddies would just chunk him in the direction he wanted to go...

the cool thing about the verts is that they really don't look all that pathological. they look like they sort of grew that way on purpose. just to make people wonder about them in 70 million years...

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Really nice vert, JohnJ..

Unusual too I would think. Wonder what caused that.

Have seen parts of bones fused (not mosasaurs) but

not like that. I suppose even a birth defect is possible.

Welcome to the forum!

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broken/somewhat healed jaw in situ, which looked like a deer to me. you can see on the jaw to the left of the broken teeth where the bone granulated in. it is raised and of a granulomatous texture unlike the surrounding laminar-appearing bone. i've wondered if pain and difficulty in eating resulted in the animal's demise.

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This is a really "twisted" tooth.

Perhaps a bit hard to see, but the crown twists 90 degrees from root to tip, so the tip is pretty much perpendicular to the base of the crown.

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"And the men who hold high places, Must be the ones to start

To mould a new reality, Closer to the Heart"

(Rush, "Closer to the Heart" from the album "A Farewell to Kings")

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