Volunteer fossil hunter scoops the pros—finds giant dinosaur bone!

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You don’t have to be a PhD. to make an amazing dinosaur discovery. This week paleontologists confirmed that volunteer bone hunter, Kay Fredette, has discovered the largest Apatosaurus femur ever found.

While helping on a dig in Colorado she and another volunteer unearthed the colossal bone (6ft 7inches long) which scientists say came from the leg of a dinosaur that was 80 to 90 long.

And this isn’t her first big find either… in recent years Kay has bagged a handful of sauropods, and even well-preserved dinosaur skin.

 

Check out the story here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/24/volunteer-finds-apatosaurus-femur_n_5522631.html

The Time Eater: A Foster Raymond Fossil Hunter Novel is available now in paperback and eBook at Amazon.ca and as an eBook at Indigo, Kobo and Barnes & Noble

Find out more about Andy Haynes on LinkedIn and Instagram.

Plant-eating Giant Dinosaurs Survived in the Canadian Arctic

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Plant-eating Giant Dinosaurs Survived in the Canadian Arctic

Arctic journal reports that the vertebra of a duck-billed hadrosaur from the cretaceous period found in the northern Canadian territory of Nunavut suggests that the giant herbivore made its home in the hostile northern region year-round. In fact, the bone found on Axel Heiberg Island is the northern most fossil find ever recorded.
Although the average Arctic temperature was fifteen degrees warmer than today, the hadrosaurs still had to contend with a complete absence of daylight for almost half the year. The relative cold and lack of a plant-life meant a tough life for the hardy duck-bill. Mostly they would have scavenged twigs, decaying wood and fungi to survive. And migration was impossible because the island on which the fossil was found was cut off from the rest of North America by two seas.
It seems the more we learn about dinosaurs in the fossil record the more surprising and extreme they become. You go dinosaurs!
Check out the full story here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2014/04/04/hadrosaur-northernmost-dinosaur-nunavut_n_5094151.html
image: Getty Images

The Time Eater: A Foster Raymond Fossil Hunter Novel is available now in paperback and eBook at Amazon.ca and as an eBook at Indigo, Kobo and Barnes & Noble

Find out more about Andy Haynes on LinkedIn and Instagram.

Wild Weather Unearths Bombs, Rats and Dinosaurs!

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Wild Weather Unearths Bombs, Sea Mice and Dinosaurs!

In this wildest and weirdest of winters, storms have battered much of the UK creating massive floods. And the rising waters have brought some odd-ball things to light. Workers at a Welsh golf course found a three-foot long Cod lying on the third green. Bombs dropped into the sea by the Germans during WWII were washed ashore on the giant tides. And in the most incredible reveal of all a complete ichthyosaur skeleton was revealed by storms along the Dorset Coast.
Check out the rest of the strange sightings in this article:
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/453201/Second-World-War-bombs-dinosaur-bones-and-mice-some-of-the-things-washed-up-by-the-storms

The Time Eater: A Foster Raymond Fossil Hunter Novel is available now in paperback and eBook at Amazon.ca and as an eBook at Indigo, Kobo and Barnes & Noble

Find out more about Andy Haynes on LinkedIn and Instagram.

Nicholas Cage’s Tarbosaurus Skull Came from Convicted Fossil Thief

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Nicholas Cage’s Tarbosaurus Skull Came from Convicted Fossil Thief

Cage outbid Leonardo DiCaprio for the 67-million-year-old T. Bataar skull at auction in 2007. But it now seems the biggest prehistoric skull ever found was provided by Eric Prokopi—a real life Time Eater.

Prokopi is currently facing 17 years in jail for stealing fossils from the rich beds of China and Mongolia, and selling them to private collectors—removing them from the light of science forever.

It doesn’t seem Cage or DiCaprio knew where the skull came from at the time—but the practice of collecting these great finds is in itself preventing paleontologists from properly examining finds and hurting our understanding of the great beasts.

More info here:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/wild_things/2013/10/29/nicolas_cage_stolen_dinosaur_skull_hollywood_stars_should_stop_collecting.html

The Time Eater: A Foster Raymond Fossil Hunter Novel is available now in paperback and eBook at Amazon.ca and as an eBook at Indigo, Kobo and Barnes & Noble

Find out more about Andy Haynes on LinkedIn and Instagram.

The Real Life Inspiration for Indiana Jones

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The Real Life Inspiration for Indiana Jones

Fossil Hunter Roy Chapman Andrews traveled Mongolia by camel and horse–fought packs of snakes–and discovered the terrifying Velociraptor!

Learn more here: http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2013/09/amazing-life-roy-chapman-andrews/

The Time Eater: A Foster Raymond Fossil Hunter Novel is available now in paperback and eBook at Amazon.ca and as an eBook at Indigo, Kobo and Barnes & Noble

Find out more about Andy Haynes on LinkedIn and Instagram.

Hell Creek T. Rex Opens Door to Real Jurassic Park

Well, it’s a crazy long-shot to be honest. But viable soft tissue and cells found in a T. rex fossil could theoretically yield dino DNA! Check out what the NY Times has to say about it:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/25/science/25dino.html?_r=0

The Time Eater: A Foster Raymond Fossil Hunter Novel is available now in paperback and eBook at Amazon.ca and as an eBook at Indigo, Kobo and Barnes & Noble

Find out more about Andy Haynes on LinkedIn and Instagram.

Teenage Fossil Hunter Discovers Weird Dinosaur!

A great friend of mine, Erik Ellefsen, sent me this link to an NBC story about a teenage fossil hunter who beat the pros to discover a baby dinosaur– awesome stuff!

http://www.nbcnews.com/science/how-teenager-beat-out-pros-find-weird-baby-dinosaur-8C11434434

The Time Eater: A Foster Raymond Fossil Hunter Novel is available now in paperback and eBook at Amazon.ca and as an eBook at Indigo, Kobo and Barnes & Noble

Find out more about Andy Haynes on LinkedIn and Instagram.