skull ID?

[Slow Walker]

Found a poorly fossilized complete skull in Pierre shale in western SD. Looks like mosasaur or alligator shaped. 

Can anyone help me ID the species type? The teeth are from the front of mouth. 

EDIT: The skull is 2ft long. Teeth are 1in long. The skull was in a jacket that I mostly removed along with most of the shale. What you see is the fossil.  Since it is poorly fossilized I don't think there is any ID features from the skull other than teeth. 

Edited May 4 by Slow Walker

[Jaybot]

Mosasaur?  I'm no expert, but they are known from Pierre shale.

[Brevicollis]

It really might be a mosasaur skull

Great find 

 

Edited May 4 by Brevicollis

[Jaybot]

@Brevicollis again, I'm not an expert, but I did find this paper just now:

https://bioone.org/journals/palaios/volume-32/issue-5/palo.2016.090/ANATOMICALLY-LINKED-OCCURRENCE-OF-CONCRETIONARY-PRESERVATION-OF-MOSASAURS-FROM-THE/10.2110/palo.2016.090.short

 

Could it be we are viewing some concretionary material, and the skull is only partially exposed (where the tooth is sticking out)?

I'm not arguing one way or the other, just a thought.

 

For the OP's sake, that would be awesome if there was a mosasaur snout that needs prepped out...

[Brevicollis]

Can you please provide us with more pictures from different angles?

Its a really nice find, the symmetry, the teeth suggest it being one.

[garyc]

I think you’ll do a lot better getting an id if you post pictures with a tape measure for scale. Also, several more pictures of the skull showing different angles will help. 

[SPrice]

I can see the attached  tooth and other teeth spots on the right side, I'm wondering though if this would fair better in a jacket???

 

IDK, just guessing from what little I know  about vertebrates since they're not collectable in Utah, and my experience with invertebrates should apply to vertebrates as well by consolidating the entire specimen as much as possible before prepping it out can be a positive outcome for the finished piece. 

[JorisVV]

@Praefectusyour area perhaps

[rocket]

9 hours ago, Slow Walker said:

Found a poorly fossilized complete skull in Pierre shale. Looks like mosasaur or alligator shaped. 

Can anyone help me ID the species type? The teeth are from the front of mouth.

 

Could you post some views from the sides and the back - part?

Possible to see a bit on the pics, but not good enough to be clear

Mosasaur  is my first opinion, too

thanks 

[Slow Walker]

8 hours ago, Jaybot said:

@Brevicollis again, I'm not an expert, but I did find this paper just now:

https://bioone.org/journals/palaios/volume-32/issue-5/palo.2016.090/ANATOMICALLY-LINKED-OCCURRENCE-OF-CONCRETIONARY-PRESERVATION-OF-MOSASAURS-FROM-THE/10.2110/palo.2016.090.short

 

Could it be we are viewing some concretionary material, and the skull is only partially exposed (where the tooth is sticking out)?

I'm not arguing one way or the other, just a thought.

 

For the OP's sake, that would be awesome if there was a mosasaur snout that needs prepped out...

 I don't think there is much hard concretion on it as it looks like all the edges are fossil and maybe only part of the underside of the mouth got kind of pushed in wards with some light concretion between all the fossils which makes it very hard to identify using the skull fossils. I added an edit to original message.

[Slow Walker]

8 hours ago, Brevicollis said:

Can you please provide us with more pictures from different angles?

Its a really nice find, the symmetry, the teeth suggest it being one.

 I think the only ID feature is the teeth as the skull is poorly preserved. I added an edit to original message.

[Slow Walker]

8 hours ago, garyc said:

I think you’ll do a lot better getting an id if you post pictures with a tape measure for scale. Also, several more pictures of the skull showing different angles will help. 

 Thanks, I added an edit to original message.

[Slow Walker]

8 hours ago, SPrice said:

I can see the attached  tooth and other teeth spots on the right side, I'm wondering though if this would fair better in a jacket???

 

IDK, just guessing from what little I know  about vertebrates since they're not collectable in Utah, and my experience with invertebrates should apply to vertebrates as well by consolidating the entire specimen as much as possible before prepping it out can be a positive outcome for the finished piece. 

 It was in a jacket and the teeth were already cracked in situ. I put them aside during preparation.  Most of the teeth were already damaged by freezing and thawing. I added more information to original message.

[Slow Walker]

5 hours ago, JorisVV said:

@Praefectusyour area perhaps

 Thanks I added that to the original message.

[Slow Walker]

2 hours ago, rocket said:

 

Could you post some views from the sides and the back - part?

Possible to see a bit on the pics, but not good enough to be clear

Mosasaur  is my first opinion, too

thanks 

 Since it's such poorly preserved I don't think you can id anything from the skull. I was hoping the teeth would help.

[SPrice]

Thanks for the updates! Really nice find. 

[rocket]

3 hours ago, Slow Walker said:

 Since it's such poorly preserved I don't think you can id anything from the skull. I was hoping the teeth would help.

 

I am sure it could be identified. It does not look to bad, possible to see the skull / cranial seams, perhaps position and shape of the eye and the upper jaw. My opinion is, that it will be a good collectors item after prepp!

[jpc]

In your last photo, are we still seeing concretion in the lower right and left edges of the jacket?

 

From the Pierre Shale, I assume?  Looks like a mosasaur.  Not sure which one, but the teeth should be identifiable.  Are you familiar with this...

https://elischolar.library.yale.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1022&context=peabody_museum_natural_history_bulletin

[Slow Walker]

8 hours ago, rocket said:

 

I am sure it could be identified. It does not look to bad, possible to see the skull / cranial seams, perhaps position and shape of the eye and the upper jaw. My opinion is, that it will be a good collectors item after prepp!

I believe those parts are shown in the pictures just hard to notice with fossil and situ being similar color.

I hope you are right! 

[Slow Walker]

8 hours ago, jpc said:

In your last photo, are we still seeing concretion in the lower right and left edges of the jacket?

 

From the Pierre Shale, I assume?  Looks like a mosasaur.  Not sure which one, but the teeth should be identifiable.  Are you familiar with this...

https://elischolar.library.yale.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1022&context=peabody_museum_natural_history_bulletin

As far as I can tell there's no concretion in it. Unless you mean how the bones are cemented together.  The part that still has the jacket on was the eroding side and has weathered fossils and shale. 

I am not familiar with that. Looks very helpful, thanks! 

[pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon]

Could you please post some more photographs of the skull? Right now it's very hard, if not impossible, to get an overview of the entire specimen and thereby make out what's what in the photograph. For, while the fossil may outwardly look like an alligator, this is not likely to be the case, as proper alligators only date to the Late Eocene. Just based on the tooth, I'd say it's more likely that this is a mosasaurine mosasaur, belonging to the genus Mosasaurus, for which the snout, however, would be too wide, if we're to assume that what we're seeing in the photographs is the actual extent of the skull. While the skull may not be diagnostic, it will provide us with context that will better help identify the piece.

[Slow Walker]

1 hour ago, pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon said:

Could you please post some more photographs of the skull? Right now it's very hard, if not impossible, to get an overview of the entire specimen and thereby make out what's what in the photograph. For, while the fossil may outwardly look like an alligator, this is not likely to be the case, as proper alligators only date to the Late Eocene. Just based on the tooth, I'd say it's more likely that this is a mosasaurine mosasaur, belonging to the genus Mosasaurus, for which the snout, however, would be too wide, if we're to assume that what we're seeing in the photographs is the actual extent of the skull. While the skull may not be diagnostic, it will provide us with context that will better help identify the piece.

Thanks for the insight. I prepped the jacket in a holding container but now I don't feel safe to move it out so I can't take side photos. The jaw might be smashed a bit. Hard for me to tell even irl. I'll try to take more photos of the parts that already have natural breaks which I can move. 

[Slow Walker]

Here is close up of the tip and middle of the snout. Also both eye sockets. The teeth were broken during weathering. The skull was found upside down in situ. I don't think there's anything diagnostic in the photos. 

[Jaybot]

I see what you mean with the poor preservation.  Still though, I think air abrasion in a professional prepper's hands could make this a nice specimen. 

[Tidgy's Dad]

Interesting and possibly important find, perhaps?

I think that needs consolidating and / or prepping pretty pronto.

Edited May 7 by Tidgy's Dad