Fossil Crates

08/06/2026

Dangerous Seas!

The Rocky Mountain Dinosaur Resource Center in Woodland Park, Colorado has one of my all-time favorite marine displays. This is but a small component of what is a stunning room replete with Late Cretaceous Western Interior Seaway beasts collected mostly from Kansas.

“lizard tooth” is so named because the teeth, well they look like those of a reptile. Many a collector of fossils get these teeth misattributed to mosasaurs. The specimen on the wall is among the best ever collected.

They reached 9’ in length and, as an ichthyodectid, were voracious predators. The genus is also known from Italy, indicating the globality fish can achieve :-).

is a shark that exceeded the size of the largest Great White Shark of today. Its teeth were brutally efficient. A king in any other venue, it took a back seat to giant mosasaurs. That didn’t keep it from eating mosasaurs, pterosaurs, and fish of all sorts, as is evidenced by stomach contents. A number of these have been found where the otherwise-never-preserves cartilage has been calcified. The one on the wall here is a cast. The Sternberg Museum has a wonderful skull+body fossil on display of a different specimen.

, the fabled “bulldog fish,” so nicknamed because of its wild, oddly jutting, snaggly mouth, reached possibly up to 20’ if a few giant pieces can be used to predict size. ~17’ is the longest complete one. This is the genus of the “fish within a fish,” where a few have been found with swallowed Gillicus fish half+ the length of the Xiphi, resulting in a fatal case of eyes larger than its stomach. Tis an ichthyodectid related to Saurodon. The life resto’s coloration choice is speculative, hut most predators have a low-key coloration for camouflage purposes.

That’s me, Dr. BC (aka Brian Curtice, I have profusely thanked my parents for such wonderful initials!), for scale.

07/06/2026

Scale Snack ;-)

went from being the largest flying creature we knew of, albeit one with an enigmatic diet, to being hypothesized as being among the more bizarre ground predators.

This Quetzalcoatlus northopi skull was built using scans of the fragmentary cranial remains known from the Texas material supplemented by the smaller Q. lawsoni elements for which we have reasonably complete skull material.

At 9’ in length (as modeled here,) the skull resembles two industrial-strength chopsticks. The toothless mouth was presumed to be used to stab fish but, in recent times, has been hypothesized to be used to pluck small vertebrates from the ground, hunting akin to a marabou stork x giraffe.

Paleoart sometimes portrays a sauropod being snatched up, thus the inspiration for this image. I was studying “Tony” the baby diplodocid in Aathal, Switzerland (this is me and a cast at the University of Wyoming Geology Musuem) when this image idea struck.

Tis thought many (all?) sauropods treated their young like sea turtles. They laid nests with scores of eggs alongside other sauropod nests and over the course of a few days the eggs hatch and the tiny, defenseless sauropods emerge to face a cruel world, one that views them as snack food for essentially anything that has a hankerin’ for long neck y tail.

I have watched countless predatory bird events work the same way. The bird strikes akin to a living lighting bolt, neck un-“ess”ing with the tips of the elongate beak making contact. The prey is either skewered or grasped, then the neck retracts, the prey wriggling mightily to get free. I have observed some prey escaping at this moment, only to be reacquired.

The birds carefully, albeit quickly, reposition the food for what comes next, the toss. The bird flips its head back, propelling the prey down the gullet, sometimes sending them into the air before perfectly landing it in the back of the throat. The mouth shuts and, on larger prey, one can actually watch it descend into the stomach.

Quetz may have executed the same maneuver. Snake-like neck strike, impulse, flip, swallow. Sadly I can imagine a newly hatched titanosaur disappearing. :-(

05/06/2026

All airports should have dinosaurs!

The at the Salt Lake City International Airport in Salt Lake City, Utah.

I visit this specimen a number of times a year, greeting the nemesis of beloved sauropods with a smile and a nod.

It roamed about in Late Jurassic of the western U.S. as well as Europe. Utah is well known for specimens, think Dinosaur National Monument and Cleveland-Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry. The two combined to form the literal book on Allosaurus, Madsen’s 1976 Osteology of Allosaurus. Four decades later Chure and Loewen advanced it again, with their incredible detailed paper introducing A. jimmadseni.

Someday I should gather all of the selfies Inhave taken with this specimen over the years. Located at the top but behind the long escalator that takes one to the B gates, I marvel at the number of folks leaving Salt Lake that miss it. For those arriving tis often seen once they are on the very long escalator that takes them to the exit, meaning they will miss the experience. Now you know to seek it out without that escalator ride (if you’ve been to SLC airport you know what I mean :-)).

I love the “horns” on the skull from this angle. One doesn’t always appreciate the lacrimal projection up close.

04/06/2026

04/06/2026

Open Wiiiiiiide!

, the “lion bear,” has some of the most impressive teeth of any carnivore. It is placed in its own subgroup within the feliformes as tis quite different from other “cats.” It has been posited it was the size of the largest lion but built stocky like a bear (think 700 lbs, though that number has been questioned). Truly a beast to behold!

This simulation of the mouth opening wide enough to deploy those canines had me giggling for days after. I had so much fun opening and closing that mouth! You, too, can play with it as tis at Morrill Hall at the university of Nebraska Lincoln campus.

Saber-toothed animals are able to use their teeth quite easily. In Barbouro’s case it had a wide gape, the mouth opening betwixt 90 and maybe 120 degrees (think late June low/high here in Phoenix ;-)). Studies conflict on the actual number but, like the Dodge Daytona/Plymouth Superbird with their giant fin being a practical solution for opening the trunk, so to must these animals been able to open their mouth wide enough to eat. (One of my quirkier analogies that certainly dates me to a specific era hahahaha).

It lived ~7 million years ago from Nevada to Texas, with Kansas and Nebraska being other happy hunting grounds. It either took the time to ambush rhinos, proboscideans, and horses or it made short work of smaller fare.

In speaking with folks after yesterday’s post I have come to learn most now consider it the largest nimravid, or false sabertooth. It isn’t particularly close to Smilodon, which is a macharirodont, another group of feliforms. Apparently “cats” like their big canines, as it appeared repeatedly in their lineage. One can argue the clouded leopard of today is a sabertooth of sorts (check out one’s skull!).

I have had the honor of holding the holotype of B. fricki and it blew me away with how awesome it is. It would be fantastic to have a cast of one. I need to build an exhibit putting as many sabertooth critters as I can side by side. Think Inostrancevia, Uintatherium ;-), Smilodon, Barbourofelis, Ceratosaurus ;-), and many more.

This can be found on the second floor of Morrill Hall at UNL.

03/06/2026

Meet Barbourofelis fricki

The skull that inspired this amazing life resto “was discovered only a few days after Dr. Barbour’s death in 1947.” He was the Director of the University of Nebraska State Museum where this sculpt can be seen. The skull was named after him in 1970.

The species celebrates Childs Frick, who worked there as well. This Batman and Robin combo advanced Nebraska paleo considerably, and tis appropriate to have named one of the coolest carnivore skulls ever found after them.

It sits in its own family, Barbourofelidae, as they differ from all other carnivores. A friend calls ‘em lion-bears thanks to their stocky body and powerful limbs. It was roughly the size of a large African lion ‘roided up like a bear.

Notice the saberguard (=flange on the ramus) projects down quite far on the lower jaw and may have worked to keep sabers a tad sharp. Those sabers are parallel to one another, differing from Thylacosmilus, the marsupial sabertooth, wherein the sabers appear to diverge ventrally, thus letting them slash-stab like pigs vs the more traditional up-and-down stab of Barbouro. The latter leaves two massive puncture wounds in the victim, with blood flow and severed tissues being the immediate result of a “double tap.”

The skull is short front-to-back, which differs from the longer, more typical skulls of Smilodon and other felids. The shortening is a result of a short post-muzzle skull, aka smaller braincase. It has a high sagital crest which provides extremely powerful temporal muscles. Bite-city! The absolutely massive postorbital bar, lacking in other sabertooths (oddly, the aforementioned Thylacosmilus has ‘em), may help keep the back of the eye orbit safe when stabbing.

Twas likely a camouflaged ambush predator, patiently waiting to leap atop prey. Perhaps it rose up on hind legs, using its gigantic forepaws to swipe/punch/stun, then “open up and say awwww,” as it stabbed with tremendous force the neck or spinal region.

Did it have lips covering those huge teeth? Hard to say. A mummified Homotherium cub seems to have extra large upper lips, but Barbouro (and Smilodon) has next-level sabers, so maybe not.

01/06/2026

Happy International Dinosaur Day!

Ever wonder where this dinosaur holiday actually came from? Dr. BC dug into the origin of International Dinosaur Day, why it caught on, and how dinosaur fans around the world use it to celebrate paleontology, museums, fossil discoveries, and the animals that still capture our imagination.

Read the blog here:
https://www.fossilcrates.com/blogs/news/international-dinosaur-days-and-reflections

Such is the popularity of dinosaurs that they have two International Dinosaur Days, June 1st and the 3rd Tuesday in May. A bit of internet sleuthing revealed Dinosaurs Day on August 2nd. Throw in Fossil Day on October 13th and dinosaurs begin to run up the national/international celebration score! D...

31/05/2026

Allosaurus!

This gorgeously colored composite cast is on display at the Badlands Dinosaur Museum in Dickinson, North Dakota. This museum caught me by surprise. It has a stunning array of world-class Cretaceous skulls on display. Many of the fossils in the building were excavated locally by one of the best teams in the business. Tip o’ the hat to the Fowlers for showing how strong a museum can be!

This Allosaurus is a composite from the Cleveland-Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry (now part of the Jurassic National Monument). The specimen is ~30’ long and is one of the most common commonly seen Allosaurus casts, being the first readily available commercial offerings from the Madsen family’s Dinolab that started in the 1980s (we offer casts of it for sale today, DM/email me if you need one (shameless plug over :-)). It is usually painted a deep black matching the original bones, or various shades of gray, but I love this one’s desert tan hue.

I enjoy the pose of this specimen, especially how it highlights the tail’s balance capability. The turning pose imparts motion in a neat way.

You can see me in the back, for scale. I am offset
~8 feet behind the skeleton, it is not T. rex sized :-), but it is plenty big!

If you like fossils and find yourself anywhere near Dickinson, North Dakota, you owe it to yourself to stop by. Over the coming weeks we will be revealing additional videos of the aforementioned amazing material.

Commissioned artwork from, in order of appearance:
Sean Fox, Carlos Garcia Ruiz, Gustavo Monroy, Sean Fox, Sean Fox, Sean Fox, Gustavo Monroy. These lads are fantastic to work with!terrible.lizard.gallery .monroy

29/05/2026

!

Tis upwards of 5’+ tall at the shoulder and over a half ton in weight. This ~30 mya pig/hippo relative is sometimes classified in a group with hippos and whales called the Whippomorpha, (I love that name!).

Imagine a feral hog the size of a cow with the nimbleness of a javelina, and possibly it’s temperament too. Scary! It must have been an absolute terror to anything it found offensive.

Entelodonts are incredibly cool artiodactyls aka even-toed mammals. These beasts were seemingly omnivores, with non-bladed massive crushing teeth.

Poebrotherium is a camel that lived among them. They are found with bite marks on their skulls and neck vertebrae that match the teeth of these “big pigs”. Were the camels scavenged? Or run down until their necks ripped open? I think the latter!

I have held a skull of one Archaeo bitten viciously, seemingly by another “ancient beast” with puncture holes that showed no sign of healing. It seemed like a fatal encounter.

Skulls are well known, thanks to being so massive and having lived in the famous White River Formation, a famous venue that produces often exquisite fossils.

Enteledont means “complete tooth” because it has “all” of the primitive mammalian teeth: per side 3 incisors, a canine, 4 premolars and 3 molars. That is a lot of teeth!

I have touched skulls where one side of the dentition or more heavily worn than the other. After digging in I learned of the hypothesis that they favored one side of the mouth versus the other when chewing! Maybe a broken tooth led to that, or they were “handed” like we are.

These forest beasts left no descendants and died out around 18 mya. Why? I do not know. Maybe grasslands supplanted their woody home?

It had a giant jutting jugal bone on the back side of the skull, the underside of which is scarred, suggesting the massive masseter muscle attached to it, providing extra strong biting power. Aside from the flared jugal, the big adults had large bumps and bosses on their skulls that remind me of extant suids.

Daeodon (= Dinohyus) was even larger!

This incredible display is at the South Dakota school of Mines and Technology.

28/05/2026

Velociraptor it is NOT! Tis actually a Saurornitholestes!

This dinosaur may look like Velociraptor, but it is actually Saurornitholestes.

Saurornitholestes was a small, fast, feathered dromaeosaur from the Late Cretaceous of North America. Like Velociraptor, it had sharp teeth, grasping hands, a long-stiffened tail, and the famous sickle-shaped claw on the second toe.

It is a great reminder that “raptor” dinosaurs were not just one animal. They were a diverse group of bird-like predators spread across different continents and ecosystems.

This cast is on display at the Rudyard Depot Museum in Rudyard, Montana. The museum is built in a retired train depot and preserves artifacts representing the nearby area. Some of these include original material dinosaur bones, plus a few casts. It was a fun place to visit.