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White river bone plate prep


IonRocks

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I'm currently working on a very bulky bone plate, and cleaning up a camel ankle I repaired. Thought you guys might like seeing some of the work.

 The long bone (I believe it's the 3rd metacarpal) is 4 inches long. 

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And here is the bone plate. It measures about 8 inches long. I'm not entirely sure what animal it is from, but I suspect oreodont (but with the limited bone exposure it is hard to have much of any idea) . Currenly I'm working on figuring out the layout of the bones, it is supposed to be a leg and foot.

 

I'll be doing bulk matrix removal using an electric engraver, and working near the bone with a variation of an X-acto knife. 

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Here is after a little while of work, along with my suspected bone layout (only for bones with ends visible,which I have picked out three ends, two broke ends, one natural end) 

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@IonRocks any info on specific Formation/Member? How about general location of the find?

Frango Ut Patefaciam...I Break in Order to Reveal :hammer01:

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@Minnesota Nice It's from Wyoming, East of Casper. Chadron Formation I believe.

I did not personally collect these (I wish I had access to a site to do so haha) I purchased them (the Peobrotherium ankle being purchased in pieces, I had already assembled it before taking a picture) 

 

Here is after maybe five hours of work (? Approximation, it's likely been more than that. I've been working fairly slowly to avoid prep marks on the bone)

I apologize for the wetatrix to the side, doing a bit of dust control there as I was cleaning it off for the picture

 

There's currently about two inches of bone exposed (for reference in the  last image there was about .75-1 inch of exposed bone)

Interestingly, there's a few cracks running through the bone (one of which is at the very end of this exposure, where the whole block was previously cracked) The other two are likely pre-fossilization cracks

The identification I recieved with this was somewhat odd (in that it was written as an entirely different body part than what it is) but I'm thinking the species is probably correct being Miniochoerus gracilis. Mainly due to the bones size. But I won't know for sure until it's prepped out fully 

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great progress so far. Are you intending on completely freeing the pieces from the matrix?

Frango Ut Patefaciam...I Break in Order to Reveal :hammer01:

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@Minnesota Nice It depends on if there is articulation and if so how much separation etc.

I intend to start by just getting the matrix off of what I'm calling the top of the rock, then deciding from there. But I may just smooth out the rock around it and maybe shape it for better display.

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3 hours ago, IonRocks said:

@Minnesota Nice It depends on if there is articulation and if so how much separation etc.

I intend to start by just getting the matrix off of what I'm calling the top of the rock, then deciding from there. But I may just smooth out the rock around it and maybe shape it for better display.

Having prepped a lot of these, I will just say that I think they look better as bones on a rock.  better than bones out of a rock.  

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  • 2 weeks later...

Here Is the first bone I'm working on currently. I will point out that near the end of the bone I misinterpreted its orientation in the rock, and messed up the end thoroughly. Sadly, the breakage of this bone end will just have to be learning for me in prep technique (and that I should seek out a better diagram/example of these bones than what I used) 

Though, the large hole in the bone is due to it being missing from the original rock after it was glued (I got it after it was glued)  

But it also provides me with an opportunity to try and reconstruct a small area, eventually.

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