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Kem kem fossil bones


Haravex

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Honestly not expecting too much in terms of identification on these pieces but one can hope, the first image going left to right, has a curved shape to it seems solid and not hollow, second one along is hollow, third one is like a half shape inside and has small bumps that almost look like tiny teeth, 4th is solid, 5th is also solid and has a pattern on one side that reminds me of crocodile form like, 6 has no apparent breaks to it and sounds hollow when taping it and the 7th is also solid looks like maybe a rib, but with lines going down it.

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  • 3 weeks later...

That fifth bone from the left in the first photo is defiitely a croc skull bone. Likely part of the skull roof.

Olof Moleman AKA Lord Trilobite

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Thank you @LordTrilobite always giving me advice any idea on the others or are they too vague to put a description on? Also I have a limb bone which has been worn by water but seems solid i.e. not hollow like would be expected of theropod material will post pictures later when home

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Yeah many of those bones are probably too fragmentary to ID. At least from photos. holding a fossil in your hand always gives a better idea what the shape is like.

Olof Moleman AKA Lord Trilobite

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This is one that i sadly missed buying however if it is still present I will get it, it weighed about 5kg and was about 70cm long.

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On 9/10/2017 at 6:20 AM, Haravex said:

@Troodon would love to have your opinion on some of these remains.

 

Isolated partial bones are very tough to identify especially without ends, sorry cannot help.

 

Boy you don't see many large theropod bones on the market from the Kem Kem pretty cool.  Is it a femur ? Sorry you missed out.

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I would imagine it is from the leg due to its size so that gives me two options the femur or the tibia, and its definitely hollow in the middle even, so that indicates theropod so from this its one of two possible leg bones from a larger dinosaur, with the 3 popular options being carchar, spino and sigil. Oh and was meaning the you opinion on the other remains specifically the possible post orbital, QJ or as two different museum staff have told me it could be a scapula, and the other one suggested he didn't know anything about dinosaurs and that it might be crocodile.

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I don't think that leg bone is a Spinosaurid because it's too hollow might be a Carch.  Spino bones are more dense.

 

I would lean toward that odd bone being a skull element but like any partial bones without careful examination of comparative material who knows.

 

Couple of other comments that small vert looks like croc.   And the scute,  might belong to a sauropod.  I have a couple like that and they were sold as sauropod Osteoderms but I'm not convinced since I have not see any evidence to support that conclusion.

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One remark/question regarding hollow Kem Kem bones: 
I own a Kem Kem bone fragment that is hollow and I showed it to a paleontologist here in Switzerland as well as two more in the UK and the US. All three said independently that this is most likely an ulna from a sauropod (not a theropod). Unfortunately undescriped. :blink: To me that was very surprising. Below please find a picture (length is around 52cm / 20inch).

 

So I assume that both sauropods and theropods can have hollow bones? Maybe Sauropod bone walls are thicker? I would be very happy to learn more about that...

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I'm far very far from being an expert on sauropods but I've never seen or heard that their limb bones were hollow.  I quickly referred to a good reference book on sauropods  "Thunder Lizards" edited by Ken Carpenter and I did not see any mention or images of hollow bones.  The hollow bones in sauropods that I'm familiar with are associated with air sacs and hollow cavaties in the vertebrae and osteoderms that reduces the weight on the neck and back.  I would think that solid limb bones are necessary to support their massive weight.  

Here is a comment from AMNH 

"Hollow Bones 
One characteristic shared by all theropods (avian and non-avian) is the presence of hollow bones. More primitive dinosaurs like sauropods do not have hollow bones. The hollow bones are the long bones (as in the legs) of theropods. They have thin walls and are tubular in shape. Hollow bones reduced the amount of weight carried by the animal resulting in the non-avian theropods' ability to run faster. These hollow bones provided space for the air sacs in avians-extensions of the respiratory system-to supply the high levels of oxygen necessary for their active hunting. This feature also probably played a role in the evolution of flight in avians."

 

When it comes to the thickness of theropod bones it depends on the critter.  The attached image shows cross-sections of femurs of various theropods. This was done as part of a study on Spinosaurus showing they have very a dense bones because they were in an semiaquatic environment.

 

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This might sound like a dumb question but the limb bone above (of which a friend over in merzouga has bought for me :dinothumb:) comparing it to the theropod chart above could it belong to suchomimus? I know they are found in niger but was just wondering due to the time period and locality of the to regions. Also what bones would have a thickness of 1mm

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15 minutes ago, Haravex said:

This might sound like a dumb question but the limb bone above (of which a friend over in merzouga has bought for me :dinothumb:) comparing it to the theropod chart above could it belong to suchomimus? I know they are found in niger but was just wondering due to the time period and locality of the to regions. Also what bones would have a thickness of 1mm

 

Very unlikely.  There are a few other large theropods in the Kem Kem.    1mm bones could be pterosaur or avian 

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yeah I'm thinking carchar as you said it might be, and was just a thought. What avian creatures existed at that time other than pterosaurs?

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I've heard of the raptors that are present in Kem Kem being described as Velociraptorine. And it does seem like that might be actual birds present as well.

Olof Moleman AKA Lord Trilobite

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Very nice rib one of the best I've seen.  It has good affinities to the one shown in Stromers paper.   Having said that it's possible that it's Spinosaurid but without having an understanding of what is diagnostic on ribs from other theropods in the Kem Kem not sure you can conclusively say it's one.   

 

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Your thin-walled bone can be from anything.  Not sure you can say much from those fragments.

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Stromer devotes approximately two pages to the ribs,BTW.I know ,because I posted the whole article ,a while back . 

The verbal descriptions do add something, I feel,but maybe that's just me.

Legenda to Stromer's plates :

56ghb.jpg

 

 

 

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