Elasmosaur

[Shellseeker]

http://www.livescience.com/51736-ancient-reptile-fossil-elasmosaur.html

In the news: Do we have Alaskan TFF members. What finds are hidng up there in cold country?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elasmosaurus

Looks like some pretty impressive teeth...

[ZiggieCie]

[jpc]

I am not an AK member, but I have been there. I patiently await the publication of Alaska's most compmlete vertebrtate fossil, a small Triassic thallatosaur from southeast AK. I did the prep work on it over the past three winters up in Fairbanks.

[jpc]

Here are a few pix of fossils and more from AK. These might be a breath of fresh air for those feeling excessivley warmed by August in the lower 48. I can't show you pix of the critter I worked on until it is published.... trust me...it is cool and will make the news.

First, an Eocene palm leaf from SE AK. I helped work on this one. It is about 5 feet wide, and there is a third piece that made it too big for display that made it another foot wide. It is now on display at the Museum of the North at the U of A Fairbanks.

And here is the same Dr. mentioned in the elasmosaur post sawing a block with large ichthyosaur verts and ribs in it. This is the middle of the day. This is as light as it gets in February in Fairbanks. Triassic... SE AK.

While I was there they had International Ice Carving Championships....

AK also has lots and lots and lots of Pleistocene vertebrates. And then some more Pleistocene vertebrate fossils. Here is a bison horn, likley attached to the skull in the Fairbanks Ice Tunnel.

And last but not least, yes this really exists.. I don't know if Frank Zappa was aware of this.