Mosasaur On The Sulphur River

[TRENTON-MON]

Memorial Day on the Sulphur. Weather was great. Again, me & WFRR, went walking the river. The first 3 to 4 hours didn't turn up much, a couple of verts, various bone pieces, etc... Then I walked upon 3 partially exposed verts. I immediately threw down my backpack and started scraping away the loose dirt around them. By that time, RR was there helping. What an adrenaline rush. After about 45 minutes, we had found 20+ verts, some were just the knobs. Also, 5 sections of jawbone with teeth, most were broken off, a few loose teeth. There are several large pieces of bone that I believe are lower jaw & skull sections, a few bones that I think are from the front flipper, many, many small bone fragments.

After we calmed down, the realization of just how much bone material was there, and how much weight there was, we thought about how far we were going to have to carry them. Oh well. We split the load, hauled it about a mile, what a beating. That's what friends are for, right? Thanks Randy!

After getting them home and washing them, I was really amazed at just how much stuff was there. If anyone can shed some light on any of the bones, I would greatly appreciate it.

[Auspex]

Now that's an exciting find

You caught the Sulphur in a generous mood!

[TRENTON-MON]

Thanks Auspex. Hoping to get back down there tomorrow. Generous mood is a good way to put it.

[Roz]

I have never seen that many verts taken from there! I especially love the jaw!

[Uncle Siphuncle]

Re hit that same spot right after the next several rains. I'd bet there is more. That would be find of the year for most of us.

Edited June 1, 2013 by danwoehr

[TRENTON-MON]

Neither have I Roz. Judging from the size of the teeth, I think this was a juvenile. I'm very anxious to look for more of it!

Edited June 1, 2013 by TRENTON-MON

[TRENTON-MON]

Oh, it definitely is for me Dan.

[Batty]

Welldone on a fantastic find.

[NSRhunter]

Sweet finds!!! I was also at NSR on Memorial Day and found quite a lot. Hiked up a creek and found 3 mos. verts. possible belonging to the same individual bu different placements. Also 2 arrowheads and a mosasaur jawbone tooth socket section. Now that's an awesome find!! GO back and find more!!!

[cfin1974]

i have never found anything bigger than a 2 inch shark vert, only one was 2 inch where i hunt in a brook, only cretaceous teeth thats alotta bone..good job

[wfrr]

I found a vert about 4 ft away from the bone pile up on the bank and about 15 ft behind it I was finding some decent frags when trentonmon found that heap of goodies. I suspect we will turn up more of it close by. Fun stuff !!! The other pics are on my post ...Eagleford-Ozan Trips

Edited June 1, 2013 by wfrr

[JohnJ]

Dream find! I would recommend photographing both sides, in smaller groups from straight overhead. It's hard to see distinguishing characteristics in large group photos.

If you have a quadrate in the pile, then it may be possible to ID the genus. I still see that ulna in the middle of the 1st photo. It can also be diagnostic and it looks similar to Clidastes. Additional photos might confirm. Your find is a great opportunity to learn a lot about mosasaur morphology. Enjoy the journey.

[TRENTON-MON]

Thanks for everyone's input & congrats. I will be putting more pics up soon. Still have lots of cleanup to do on them. Just wanted to get a few pics & share my find with the rest of the world.

I do think I have a quadrate, maybe 2. Not sure what these are, never found anything like them. Here you go, the best I can do tonight.

Edited June 1, 2013 by TRENTON-MON

[Jesta384]

Incredible! Did you get the GPS coords? or at least the location for a return trip

Edited June 1, 2013 by Jesta384

[TRENTON-MON]

Oh yeah, I could find it with my eyes closed.

[JohnJ]

Thanks for everyone's input & congrats. I will be putting more pics up soon. Still have lots of cleanup to do on them. Just wanted to get a few pics & share my find with the rest of the world.

I do think I have a quadrate, maybe 2. Not sure what these are, never found anything like them. Here you go, the best I can do tonight.

That's awesome. Maybe you'll find the missing pieces in your pile of finds.

[Foshunter]

I agree with Dan, continue to check the area, more is bound to show itself. Now the fun part-----wash the pieces and let dry, then assemble together the found bones. I would use white glue as it can be soaked and dis-assembled if need. You can use a more perminant glue later if needed. Putting the Mos. together will give you a better idea of what's missing. There may be a better site to illustrate Mos. anatomy but Oceans of Kansas is pretty good and will give you a better idea of what you have and what's missing. Nice find-----Tom

[megateeth]

That is amazing. Good luck on the rest of it. Can't wait to see more photos.

[ohiofossilhunter]

Since theres broken bones in it, I know you wont want it hogging up your space, so i'm willing to dispose of it for you.

Edited June 1, 2013 by ohiofossilhunter

[wfrr]

I got another close look at this puppy yesterday. There are an awful amount of crushed bones. Man something big tore this guy up. It's interesting to me. I could sit and look at it for hours. It's not museum quality but a very diagnostic tool for a couple of amatures like us to learn a lot with.

Yesterday we took shovels and excavated a large area around where we found the fossil. In the process another vert, some frags and some teeth were recovered. He got one really awesome tooth with a root on it.

You know...I get weird ideas sometimes. I wonder if we couldn't figure out the size of this thing and print out a scale size parts drawings for each part, one part at a time. For instance we have an ulna. We have a diagram that shows an ulna. I have a copier that you can blow things up with. If I blew the ulna pic up to the size of the actual ulna we'd have a hap hazzard approx % scale to blow up the rest of the pics to. Then maybe we could make a board big enough to lay out the part pics on it and glue them down. Then put what parts of the critter we could identify on the board. We'd have to buy, trade and or hunt to fill in the open spaces. We have a lot of mosasaur parts between us that would fill some of the holes. It would be pretty cool to look at. I know the skull would be a problem to come up with, but hey we're looking for one. In the NSR you just never know. In the mean time we could just display the noggin frags we've collected. Sounds like a bunch of fun to me.