Skip to content

Owner: Dinosaur skull thought to be new ceratopsian species

Catherine Saunders-Watson
Catherine Saunders-Watson
Perhaps the most widely recognizable ceratopsian is the triceratops, which first appeared during the late Maastrichtian stage of the late Cretaceous period, about 68 million years ago, in what is now North America. This mounted triceratops skeleton is on display at the Los Angeles Museum of Natural History. Photo by Allie Caulfield, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
Perhaps the most widely recognizable ceratopsian is the triceratops, which first appeared during the late Maastrichtian stage of the late Cretaceous period, about 68 million years ago, in what is now North America. This mounted triceratops skeleton is on display at the Los Angeles Museum of Natural History. Photo by Allie Caulfield, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) – The Kansas owner of a dinosaur skull found in 2012 in South Dakota field said the fossil is thought to be a new species and genus of the ceratopsian.

Professional fossil hunter John Carter, of Buffalo, South Dakota, discovered the skull and with the help of others, removed the object that was covered with four to six inches of ironstone from the ground.

Lawrence artist Alan Dietrich later purchased the fossil and hauled it to a paleontologist’s laboratory who removed the ironstone. With the rock removed, the fossil stands about 6 feet and weighs about 600 to 750 pounds.

The director of the Utah State University Eastern Prehistoric Museum confirmed the fossil was a new species of the certaopsian, a family of dinosaur that lived mostly during the Cretaceous Period and includes the triceratops, The Topeka Capital-Journal (http://bit.ly/1QlMcc4 ) reported.

Dietrich said the skull is “extraordinary” because of the placement of its 17-inch nose horn, plus other unique characteristics. He said he might display it at the Denver Coliseum Mineral, Fossil and Gem Show scheduled for mid-September and the Tuscon Gem, Mineral and Fossil Showcase early next year.

Dietrich said he believes the fossil likely will be snapped up by a museum, adding that it’s important that it go to such a facility so it will be in the “public domain” and so articles describing the skull can be published in scientific journals.

___

Information from: The Topeka (Kan.) Capital-Journal, http://www.cjonline.com

Copyright 2015 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This information may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.