Trodon tooth 3D viewer

[KimTexan]

I’m probably posting this in the wrong topic area. I’m not sure which it goes in.

 

This link is from my alma mater. I’ve posted the link before. https://fossil.swau.edu/

It’s to their fossil database. Many of the fossils have a 3D viewer option where you can look at the fossil 360 degrees. I saw this Trodon tooth on there this evening and thought it was pretty cool looking. I can’t recall ever seeing a Trodon tooth on here before so I thought I’d share the link.

It came from the Lance Formation in Wyoming. I’ve been on the dig a couple times.

I can’t get the link to go directly to the tooth so you can view it 360, but if you click on the browse tab after you go to the link then type in the catalog # HRS06576 it will take you to it.

There are over 20,000 fossils on there from the Lance formation. 

I saw lots of teeth on there. Some from species I’d never heard of before.

This is another Trodon tooth I saw on there. I think it’s very cool looking. I forgot to crop my screenshot. Oops. 

[caldigger]

That's really neat. Thanks for the post Kimmers.

[oldtimer]

Very nice link. I will have to spend some time on that site.

Thanks for posting it.

[LordTrilobite]

Definitely a very interesting and useful link.

[Troodon]

Nice link and can be useful.  By the way a lot of the teeth identified as Troodon are actually Pectinodon bakkeri  which is very common in the Lance Formation and also in the Troodontid family but having much smaller teeth.

[KimTexan]

13 hours ago, Troodon said:

Nice link and can be useful.  By the way a lot of the teeth identified as Troodon are actually Pectinodon bakkeri  which is very common in the Lance Formation and also in the Troodontid family but having much smaller teeth.

Thanks I’ll message the dig director and give him that info. He may know that, but he is the only paleontologist in the group. His PhD is actually in geology, but he pretty much only does paleontology these days. They have well over 20,000 pieces which I imagine is a bit overwhelming to manage when he has other digs he leads out in too.

I know the catalog may not be terribly accurate on some points. There were bones that I collected on there that they have someone else’s name on it and some I can’t remember collecting, which must have been collected by someone else. The biggest femur I collected is one of them. It’s 42 inches. I found one that was 54 inches, but was about a day shy of having it out when my time at the dig was up. So someone else got the credit for collecting it.

[oldtimer]

@KimTexan That must been a lot of fun and very rewarding.  It must be nice to look through thru that collection and see ones that have your name attached.

I would love to go on some similar digs. A 54 inch femur is really nice but to have your name attached to the 42" and bringing it out of the ground from it's millions of years

resting place is so cool.

[KimTexan]

@oldtimer it was fun, but I can honestly say I have never gotten so thoroughly dirty as I have gotten there being sand blasted all day on the dig site by the winds that sweep across the planes, some at gail force speeds. I loved going though. 

 

I am considering driving up there again this summer on a road trip with my daughter and maybe my son too if I can drag him away from civilization for that long. I took them once before when they were pretty young. They have got their names on a few small fossils in the catalog too.

 

The dig director invites me every year. I just got an email from him today actually. He was my mentor in college and we’ve stayed in touch over the years. He has 2 PhDs. The one geology, the other molecular biology, which is the area he was my mentor in nearly 30 yrs ago now. He uses both PhDs in his paleontology work. Since he does work on prehistoric remains found in the Arctic tundra. They get DNA from that stuff. I don’t go on those trips though.

 

He is getting old now, he is past retirement age, but I’m not sure what will happen to the dig when he retires. The group brings about 1000 + bones each year back to Texas. Hopefully he has someone who can carry on after him.

 

On the dig in Wyoming they don’t rope out a grid at the site. They have been using GPS devices to map out every bone for the last 20 years. I funded his first little inexpensive GPS venture for the project way back then. At the time my husband and I had double income with no kids so I could afford it. Now the GPS devices are something like $25K a piece! Pretty high tech and they’ve got multiples, one for each quary site.

 

You can see the bone map on the link too which is created from the GPS readings taken on each bone at the time of excavation. 

[Sagebrush Steve]

20 hours ago, KimTexan said:

They have been using GPS devices to map out every bone for the last 20 years. I funded his first little inexpensive GPS venture for the project way back then. At the time my husband and I had double income with no kids so I could afford it. Now the GPS devices are something like $25K a piece! Pretty high tech and they’ve got multiples, one for each quary site.

 

You can see the bone map on the link too which is created from the GPS readings taken on each bone at the time of excavation. 

That’s a pretty expensive GPS unit.  What accuracy do they need?  Something that expensive should get you centimeter level accuracy but there are ways to get to a meter or two accuracy with consumer GPS units using differential measurement techniques.  Of course if they’ve already got the pricey units this isn’t a concern.

 

And I looked at the bone map but I’m not sure what I’m seeing.  Could you explain it?  There doesn’t seem to be a scale visible, so I can’t tell how large an area is being shown.