6.51 Inch Aurora.JPG

holy cow!!

One awsome once in a life time tooth.--Tom

Finding this was among my greatest fossil moments indeed. I think that, as collectors, we all have those special moments in which we are blessed with a superb find and its associated memories. A friend once told me that when it comes to fossils, we are all temporary caretakers as these wonderful items were here long before us and will remain long after we are gone. I'm simply honored to have uncovered what I have found and have the opportunity to be their current caretaker.

Great monster tooth. You say 6.51" but according to the scale at the bottom, it's 7+. Could you please clarify

Great monster tooth. You say 6.51" but according to the scale at the bottom, it's 7+. Could you please clarify

It measures 6.51"- I'm honest. The ruler is flat on the surface of the table top. The tooth, which is over 1.3" thick, rises above, hence it is relatively in the foreground and closer to the camera. It creates an illusion of being larger NOT by design, only as a byproduct of perspective. It is a bit over 5 inches wide. I hope that this clarifies things as there is truly no intention to mislead whatsoever!

Great tooth; is there a strip of repair to the enamel down the middle?

This is one of three megalodons in my entire display that I actually found in more than one piece! As I have collected 329 trips to the Lee Creek phosphate mine in Aurora, I am always amazed when anything is found intact, especially considering that the huge cranes scoop up the material and drop/stack it from over a hundred feet high. I found half of this tooth wedged slightly under a clay boulder in the shade. The other half was about fifteen feet away (discovered about two minutes later). The two halves fit together perfectly! The problem was that one half was slightly bleached by the sun, hence it created an odd look, and therefore I had a professional artist touch up the color of the enamel at the middle where the two halves joined. It was split perfectly down the middle but nothing was missing! I realize that this is a long answer, but there is no artifical restoration, only a little paint at the point where the two complete halves were reconnected.

This was what I call a redemption find in that about ten years earlier, I found half of a beautiful 6.34” megalodon and spent almost six hours looking for the other half- with no luck whatsoever. I basically wasted that entire day on one hill in 1998 digging all over the place for it and swore that I’d never do that again- until this second opportunity presented itself in 2008! I really feel blessed that things turned out differently the second time around as this 6.51” Aurora megalodon is one of the largest ever found at this site.

329 trips into the mine. That is incredible. You should feel lucky since some of us are wishing we could get in just once.

I DO feel very fortunate. I've been going in there since the early 80's. The rules were a lot different back then (less of them). In those early days, you would go in for a weekend- BOTH days, so it was very easy to total lots of trips quickly and there was no limit to the number of times that you could attend during each of the two open seasons.