Wednesday, February 3, 2010
More Daspletosaurus fun
Pete 3 is rolling along in prep, with 5 jackets finished in the past week (to be fair, 2 of them were 95% done when we shelved the project last May). I'm working through the dorsal ribs and gastralia (belly ribs), because they're quick and easy and usually the last thing anyone wants to work on. The rib head below was finished yesterday, part of the material we had to pull off of the 4-ton jacket early in the prep process. The remainder of the shaft is still on the to-be-prepared shelves, but I hope to get to it very soon. Man, this Daspletosaurus was big.
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Grah! I want to work on this animal! Well I do and I don't. As discussed before, the fragmentary nature of the bones of Pete 3 looks awful.
ReplyDeleteI was interested, reading your paper, on the use of low viscosity cyanoacrylates, and this certainly seems to be the best method for stabalising material in this state of preservation. I spoke to Amy Davidson at SVP last year about their use, especially her intensive work on Shuvuuia (IGM100/977)- really good stuff..
I know you have the vast majority of the post cranial and appendicular skeleton of Pete 3 but do you have the sternal plates and/or furcula for this specimen?
Really enjoyed the paper and your prep history of this specimen.
Hi Saurian!
ReplyDeleteSo far there are no sternal plates nor furcula, however a good portion of the gastralia and ribcage are still embedded in the 4 ton main block. We'll hopefully recover a complete arm (we already have both humeri), and the right side ribs are still articulated to the dorsal vertebrae, so there is a good chance more will turn up.
Nice one Anthony - keep us posted!
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