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My Texas Bison Bonanza


KimTexan

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Last June 2018 I stumbled upon the skeleton of a bovid in a creek that was quite old considering it was down 5 feet or so in a bank. I thought it was a cow. I collected the bones that had fallen and a couple that easily came out without any real digging.
I brought them home and washed them up and most have been sitting out on my patio under a bit of cover. 


Last Wednesday night I went to the monthly Dallas Paleontological Society meeting. While there I bought a book on cow and bison fossils. 
This past Saturday I had a busy morning and afternoon and got home a little after 3:00. I sat down to read the book. It named 3 notable differences between cow and bison bones. I was reading in suspense. I wanted to know if it was cow or bison. Of course I wanted it to be bison, but assumed it was cow. I got to page 10 and the one distinguishing bone I had was a metatarsal. I went and got it and I suddenly realized it was a bison bone!!!

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I had a sudden rush of excitement. My adrenaline was flowing as I flew around the house to change clothes and gather stuff I may need. I did not know what I’d find. For all I knew everything had washed away already. It had been over 7 months. We’ve had lots and lots of rain and numerous flooding events since last June. So I was skeptical.

The place is about 40 min from my house. By the time I got everything ready and got there it was almost 4:30
It is about a 10 min walk from where I park my car. I’d never been to the creek in wet season so for all I knew it would be under water. I put on my hip wanders just in case. I got my pack and my garden hoe/claw digging tool. 
I headed out to the spot. The area above the creek is a flood plane. There was lots of standing water everywhere. 
When I got into the woods there were 2 nice 8-10 person tents there which appeared to have been vacated rapidly. 

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They were in the flood plane and looked liked they had actually been flooded. No one had returned to take them down. There were hog tracks all over the place and the odor of hog excrement in the air.
The forest floor was very mucky. I meandered through the trees and fallen limbs. The forest was fairly wide open with very little underbrush. 
I came to a point where I had to turn right to be able to find a point of access to the creek. The banks are 10 to 20 feet or more high depending upon where you’re at in the creek. The bank edge is a straight drop down into the creek so you can’t enter just anywhere.
I came to a spot where there was a 3 foot drop with a tangle of roots where I could get down to a lower level and then into the creek. Then there was a hill so I sat down to scoot over the edge and then walked carefully down the hill. From there it was a short distance to the creek. Then I turned to walk down steam. I came around the bend in the creek and saw this.

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If you look closely you can see a large whitish object. That is the bison skull. To the left were thoracic vertebra and to the right were cervical vertebrae. Go figure that one out. Then there were some ribs and the edge of other bones and then another 5 feet down on the right was a femur.


It was pretty chilly. In the low 40s with a stiff wind. Although down in the creek I was protected from the wind.  I put down my pack and took out my gloves and a chisel to probe the dirt with and pull some of it away. The base of both horns were present, but no sign of the whole horns. A tip of a horn was broken off and sitting in the cavity of the other horn on the right. Otherwise both horns were gone. I carefully lifted the horn tip out and set it aside. Here is the skull with the horn tip on the right.
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These are thoracic vertebra. There are 6 visible behind the roots.

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These are cervical vertebra. I think 5 or 6 of them exposed.

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I uncovered part of the skull to its condition. There were a couple tree roots growing through it and the skull was split in two front to back about where the upper sinus cavities were. There were cracks all over the back and side of the skull. The atlas vertebra was in place with a bone that looked a bit like a broken rib sticking out of it. I didn’t know what was going on there. It seemed fixed in place as if it belonged there. 
After seeing all the cracks I decided to go back to my car and get the bottle of cyanoacrylate, my head lamp and something to drink. I grabbed a couple plastic bags and a small plastic box. I hurried back to begin the task of excavating the vertebrae and begin pedestaling the skull. I was in for a lot of work and sunset was only 30 minutes away. But I was really hyped about the whole thing. It was more fun and play than work in my eyes.

 

I’ll post more of the story and pics tomorrow.

 

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Great report Kim.   The way you explained this I was getting excited too.   Are there any more of the leg bones?

 

RB

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5 hours ago, RJB said:

Great report Kim.   The way you explained this I was getting excited too.   Are there any more of the leg bones?

 

RB

Yes there are more leg bones. I think some have washed out down the creek, but I am pretty sure there is a tibia and other bones still in the bank. I have both ulna and radius I think. I have 2 femur and a humerus. I have a few small feet bones. I just finished washing the majority’s of the bones I collected last night. I think I have a few small boxes of fragments I haven’t washed, but I plan to leave those in the dirt they came with to help dry slowly.

Regarding bones still in the bank. I am uncertain of what the fossil collecting laws are in this type of situation. The first ones I collected had fallen out into the creek bed or were like 80% exposed in the bank. So in my mind it is surface collecting in the waterway. 

Good portions of these were exposed. The thoracic vertebrae though had the long neural process or whatever it’s called, which were still in the bank. The vertebral bodies were 80-90% exposed. The cervical verts were maybe 75% exposed without long spinous processes so I could practically lift them out. In fact I pulled 3 out all together at once.

So I can kind of reason the surface find law.  All the other bones not significantly exposed or not exposed at all I’m not sure that it falls under the law so I have left them in situ. For all I know what I’ve taken may not be in compliance with laws. It would hurt to have to turn that skull back over to someone, but if that is the right thing to do I will.

I don’t know who the owner is. It is behind a church and a large cemetery. So I doubt it’s a private individual, but a private company/organization. The waterway is reasonably big so that in some places it would qualify as a river, but not here. Right now you could probably kayak it.

 

I have reason to believe a portion of the horn on the right side may be in the bank still. I’d love to retrieve it, but since it isn’t exposed I don’t think it’s ethical. I’m not sure how to proceed at this point.

 

Recommendations would be appreciated. In all my excitement the legal component never occurred to me, until after I’d collected the 2nd day. I’ve never had this problem before so it didn’t occur to me. Also, people hunt the NSR, which I do and undertake significant excavation and there never seems to be any issues raised.

Can someone provide insight or guidance here?

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On 1/15/2019 at 6:34 AM, RJB said:

Great report Kim.   The way you explained this I was getting excited too.   Are there any more of the leg bones?

 

RB

Oh I know you’re supposed to let bones dry slowly. Is there a procedure for that? How slowly?

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Woohoo! Let's hope you find more (and are allowed to do so)!

I'd love to see the photos of the cleaned bones :) 

Max Derème

 

"I feel an echo of the lightning each time I find a fossil. [...] That is why I am a hunter: to feel that bolt of lightning every day."

   - Mary Anning >< Remarkable Creatures, Tracy Chevalier

 

Instagram: @world_of_fossils

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I need to order more supplies. I ran out of glue/stabilizer during extraction. I want to start cleaning the skull, but won’t start until I’m able to stabilize it. I’m trying to keep it moist unti then so it doesn’t get brittle. 

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That's not right leaving us all hanging....

Great find by the way' looking forward to the rest of the story with lots more pictures.

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This is going to be good.... :popcorn::popcorn::popcorn:

On The Hunt For The Trophy Otodus!

 

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Here is another pic of the bones in the bank from another angle. The bone on the far right is a femur I think.

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This is a shot of the femur in the bank.

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I took out my garden tool with a hoe on one side and a 3 prong claw on the other side. I began to swing the 3 claws deep into the bank above the skull to remove to create a cavity around the skull. There was about 5 or 6 feet of bank above the bones. The prongs worked great. Dirt was flying everywhere. I kept switching arms as one would tire. I was working up a sweat. In spite of it being in the low 40s my hair was matted with sweat. As I got closer to bones I pulled out a wood chisel and used it to gently slide into the bank and pry out the soil. Thankfully the soil was soft and came out easily.
I worked to remove the soil from the right side of the skull. I had glue, but wasn’t putting enough on it I guess. A few pieces crumbled off. I put the fragments in a small box I had along with all the soil. I backed off from that area of the skull. I put more glue on a couple more times and let it dry. The soil was fairly wet so it didn’t set too well.

While it was drying I worked to remove the cervical vertebrae. I worked on them less than 10 minutes and they were ready to lift out. They were quite stable. I tried removing the first one, but it was stuck to the others. So I lifted 3 out together and set them to the side. 

By now it was past sunset and I couldn’t see details. I went and got my head lamp and put it on. It’s the best headlamp I’ve ever had. My dad gave it to me a year ago Christmas. I worked 2 hours with it nonstop and it never dimmed. It’s adjustable and very bright with a wide or narrow beam. 
I went back to work on the skull. I chose to remove a bit of soil from underneath it. It was then that I realized the atlas vertebra was in place. 
This is a decent shot of the atlas in place.

On the bottom of the skull. The surface is tan.

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At the time I didn’t know it was called an atlas. I was thinking first cervical vertebra, which it is. Later I found out that particular vertebra is called the atlas. The next vertebra is called the axis vertebra.
Here is a diagram of them from an image search for bison vertebrae on Google.

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There was a slender bone about 5 inches long and maybe 1/2 inch or 1.5 to 2 cm in diameter protruding from the center of the atlas where the spinal column was supposed to be. The bone rotated freely, but wouldn’t pull out of the atlas. So I left it.

I had to stop and think about anatomy. I had no idea what it was, but I knew this wasn’t a bobble head bison.

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In retrospect I think maybe I should have left the atlas in place. It may have helped provide some stability, but I wanted to reduce the mass of it as much as I could, because I would have to carry it out and it would be heavy.

This is the skull without the atlas. My glove is there for scale.

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I worked to remove as much of the dirt around all of the skull and create a cavity in the bank to be able to wrap the skull up before removal. I knew I couldn’t carry it with all the mud in place. I didn’t have time to put a field cast on it and let it dry. That would have been ideal. I hope I don’t live to regret it. This location is about 40 minutes drive from my house so it isn’t exactly close.

As I worked I realized the lower right mandible would be easy to remove. So I got it extracted. It was in nice shape with teeth in place.
I worked to remove more dirt further back into the bank. I realized this was going to take a while. I thought about the tents up above which meant there could be traffic in the area. I did not wish to chance losing the skull. Since it was cracked just in front of the horns I decided to see if it would move. I expected it to barely move, but with the test it loosened the back of the skull so much that I had to follow through with removing it altogether or else it would fall off onto the ground. I wasn’t expecting that. I did not have foil with me to wrap it in. All I had was a plastic grocery bad. It was too big to fit in one.
I put it down on the ground. I looked at the portion remaining in the bank. There were a number of spots that looked pretty fragile caked in mud. I poured on more glue. I pulled a little more dirt out, but realized I needed to leave it for the next day. With it being dark it would be easy to lose fragments. So I stopped the digging. This is the remainder of the skull once I removed the back of it. It’s not pretty.You can see a root coming out of it to the left and a few smaller ones running through it. You can see a thin layer of bone across the top running diagonal. It’s still covered in dirt and mud.

Still as far as I can tell this portion looks in better shape than the other portion that I removed.

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It was now after 7:00 PM. The temperature was about 40 degrees F. I’d been out there for 2.5 hours. I had not thought of putting a second pair of socks on. My gloves were damp from the moisture of the soil. So my hands and feet were really cold. I decided I needed to wrap my work up for the night. I took the cervical vertebrae I’d removed and put them in the grocery bags then into my backpack. They were in very good shape. I didn’t have room in my pack for my tools or some other stuff so I opted to leave it there for the night. I also had some bone fragments and a small lower leg or foot bone and a rib piece.
My pack was full and heavy. I had the skull fragment and the lower mandible to carry. The back of the skull was maybe 20 lbs with all the mud in it. I headed back to my entry point. When I got to the 3 foot drop I had to put the skull down to be able to climb up. My legs weren’t strong enough to make the step up that far in the tangled roots carrying the pack and the skull.
I could hear a good size animal in the forest in the dark nearby, but I wasn’t concerned. I try to assume whatever the rustling in the bushes may be, that it is likely more afraid of me than I am of it. I’ve been in that situation so many times the fear factor has worn off. Especially since nothing and I mean nothing has ever happened. As an 8 yr old I was terrified when that happened, but then again we had things like bears and mountain lions to be afraid of. Even then nothing ever happened. It was often just a squirrel or bunny.
I stepped out of the forest into a grassy area. I was looking down, watching the ground so I didn’t trip in the dark. My headlight was still burning bright. I really love it.
I saw some movement in the dark out of the corner of my eye. I looked up to see what it was. I stopped dead in my tracks. About 7 feet away stood a skunk on full alert. I looked at him. He looked at me. I just stood still as could be watching him.  I heard a good size animal that sounded like a pig rummaging in the brush of the forest to my right about 15 feet away. I looked that direction, then quickly back at the skunk. I couldn’t see whatever it was. So I focused on the skunk, The one minute or less of stare down seemed like 5 minutes or more. Then the skunk did a 180 and waddled off into the brushy edge of the forest. I grabbed my camera and snapped a shot of him waddling off. You can’t see much other than a furry black spot on the far left side. He’s a good 20 feet away, but see how bright my headlamp is?

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I moved on slowly so as to not spook it. 
Finally my car was in sight. Yay! My arms were really tired from carrying the skull.

I put everything in the trunk and took my hip waders off. As I had been digging I guess dirt was falling down into the legs of my waders. My legs were covered with mud. I had mud all over the front of my coat from holding the skull fragment.
I hadn’t had supper. I had worked up an appetite and was really hungry. I had managed to bring one small bottle of Gatorade and that was it. I was thirsty too. I looked horrible though. My hands were covered with mud and my hair was matted. I reached into my glovebox and pulled out a container of wipes. It was empty. Leave it to my daughter to put an empty container back in the glovebox.
I went to push my hair out of my eyes and felt mud in my hair and on my scalp. I had not realized dirt had been flying into my hair as well. I had little pellets of mud covering my scalp. I tried to shake and brush them out, some only stuck worse. I didn’t have any water either. I wouldn’t be caught dead looking like this. Especially on a Saturday night in a town where everyone is out on the town and dressed up. So instead of going through a drive through or the usual Braum’s I drove home.

I’ll post more pics in a bit.

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The first 3 pics are of a jaw from a 2nd bison I believe. The bottom end in first pic it partially mineralized.

 

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This is the mandible I brought home. 2E46F79A-9884-4637-82C3-DF18A5D55727.thumb.jpeg.b7c78f359fb2026fec0a55e98aa0412e.jpeg

 

These are the atlas and the axis vertebras.

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These are most of the cervical verts that I found Saturday. There is a piece of rib and another fragment of something I haven’t figured out what it is yet. The L shaped bone is what was stuck in the atlas.

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I have more bones too. I’ll have to post them tomorrow.

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Kim as always, you are a great storyteller and I love to read your posts. It would’ve just been a lot better if you did get sprayed by the skunk, I think that would’ve been a great way to end the night LOL.

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1 hour ago, KimTexan said:

Leave it to my daughter to put an empty container back in the glovebox.

"Thats OK, mom will just replace it!" ;)

 

 

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22 minutes ago, Nimravis said:

Kim as always, you are a great storyteller and I love to read your posts. It would’ve just been a lot better if you did get sprayed by the skunk, I think that would’ve been a great way to end the night LOL.

Can you imagine having to get in your car with skunk musk all over you and drive 40 minutes back home with that reek?!

You'd have to burn the car!

I ran over a dead skunk on the highway a month ago and must have squished the wrong part and squirted the undercarriage because it still has stink attached! :(

 

 

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5 hours ago, Nimravis said:

Kim as always, you are a great storyteller and I love to read your posts. It would’ve just been a lot better if you did get sprayed by the skunk, I think that would’ve been a great way to end the night LOL.

Thank you Ralph. My kids use to love for me to tell them stories. At bedtime they’d beg me to tell them stories of when I was a little girl living in the remote Boston Mountains of Arkansas. They loved those stories.

Haha, yes that would have made for a great story, but I probably would have dropped that skull right there and destroyed it.

Not that it would have helped too much, but I am sure I would have had to go back to the creek and take a bath to get some of it off even if it was 40 degrees. I hear it burns like tear gas or something.

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I absolutely love the smell of skunk. My wife thinks I’m crazy, but it’s a great smell to me. I don’t know why that is and I know there’s a few other people that I know that also like that smell.

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I’m still excited about it. I hope to post the 2nd day of excavation/extraction this evening or tomorrow.

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12 hours ago, KimTexan said:

There is a piece of rib and another fragment of something I haven’t figured out what it is yet. The L shaped bone is what was stuck in the atlas.

The L shaped bone of course is the head of a broken rib, the straight-ish piece is probably the end of a rib from near the back (but I can't really tell how curved it is or isn't from that picture), and the third piece looks perhaps like a piece of a broken scapula but its a bit hard to tell without seeing it better.

 

Great find!!

 

 

On 1/14/2019 at 11:40 PM, KimTexan said:

To the left were thoracic vertebra and to the right were cervical vertebrae. Go figure that one out.

Could be the result of the classic "death pose" where the neck bends back on itself due to the tightening of the muscles and tendons as the deceased animal dries.  Also could be all the bones are jumbled post-mortem either by a hunter or Mother Nature.

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On 1/15/2019 at 11:26 PM, KimTexan said:

Here is another pic of the bones in the bank from another angle. The bone on the far right is a femur I think.

 

 

Many kudos to you for your enthusiasm and dedication. I know what it's like to be out in the remote areas and can remember coming around corners and having face downs with the skunk. I always let them win because I am a fast runner. Keep on collecting but make sure to let someone know where you are and when you will be getting back. Nowadays with cell phones things are easier in that regard.

 

In my case, if I am more than 4 hours past my curfew, I've left a detailed map for search and rescue to facilitate finding my carcass. Be safe while having fun out there!

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