Plioplatecarpus Necromancy: Reconstructing MOR 1062

People familiar with news in paleontology have no doubt seen that the Cretaceous Crossroads exhibit at the Museum of the Rockies recently opened in Bozeman, Montana. Like all major exhibit renovations, this project actually began years before. We at TPI were honored to be invited to work on many of the specimens now on exhibit, including many in the marine section showcasing the fauna of the Campanian-aged Bearpaw Shale. Thankfully, the staff at the Museum of the Rockies have given us permission to share part of the very involved process on how we accomplished this. 

Mosasaurus paddle in the Weskan Shale, similar to the Bearpaw Shale

The specimen I'm most proud of so far is our reconstruction of the small mosasaur MOR 1062. This little specimen is the holotype of Plioplatecarpus peckensis, and as such the very delicate original fossils are best kept securely in collections, disarticulated so researchers can study them. Some museum visitors from time to time seem disappointed that a reconstruction is on display, however what we accomplished made for the absolute best display of this rare and fragile beast.

Disarticulated skull elements of the original specimen

In late summer 2023 we went to MOR to start work on this project. A lot of it was carefully packing some other specimens for safe transport so we could mount original bones, but we also got to scan all the original elements of MOR 1062. Once we found out what was expected of us for the final product, we were a bit nervous. Raising the dead takes a lot of work, in this case nearly 2 years for the project.

Subscale skull prints for reference and outreach

You see, MOR 1062 is a beautiful specimen, however it was a touch on the incomplete side, especially beyond the skull. We would have to reconstruct the lower jaws, most of the ribs, all the paddles, and all the vertebrae from the dorsals on back to the tip of the tail. Hundreds of bones! Where do we even begin?

Early draft of the skull reconstruction, with restored elements colored in puce

The first section we restored was the skull, since the upper portion was almost complete, though most of the individual parts were separated from each other. Mosasaur researchers love their quadrate bones, and their positioning has long been a great conversation starter amongst experts. We were able to print out copies of the back corner of the skull and amazingly, the quadrate clicked into place! Don't try this by bashing the real bones together, but on 3d. This process took a long time, but we may have identified some small skull bones for this animal that initial researchers may have overlooked. We also took the most undistorted quadrate and mirrored it for better symmetry.

Final digital model of the fully reconstructed MOR 1062 skull

The jaws, and a few other skull bones, were "borrowed" from another MOR specimen and digitally modified to make them more svelte and to take out distortion. The material also needed to be resized to fit the teeny skull, and anonymized by removing any pathologies. Originally we used Platecarpus lower jaws as a stand-in, but they were fairly different in shape even though the two genera are pretty closely related. 

3D Director Evan Sonnenberg posing with the complete skeletal print

For the body, we really had to comb the literature and ask other researchers for basic info. We had hard questions like "How many vertebrae are in a Plioplatecarpus tail?" and "What do Plioplatecarpus rear limbs look like?". We were able to use our extensive digital library of our own mosasaur specimens to fill in the blanks as best we could, and finished with a complete skeleton based on real material including the costal (chest) basket. Well over 200 bones needed to be reconstructed for this and the process took many weeks.

Digitally posed 3D model

Next was the pose. Luckily we could do this all in the computer as well, coming up with a model for our assemblers to match. The specified steep diving pose was both fun to look at, and also absolutely required to help the smaller Plioplatecarpus fit in the space along with the larger Mosasaurus specimen MOR 006.

Mounted specimen in its display area while exhibit was under construction

Mounted skull provided for the Dinosaurs and MOR! event in March 2025

Our 3D Director Evan Sonnenberg was invited to talk at the 2025 Dinosaurs and MOR! event about the process and got to unveil the finished reconstruction on stage, which made a huge impression. We here at TPI would like to thank the entire crew at MOR that helped us access the specimens for this project, suggested researchers to work with, invited us to give talks, facilitated the installation of the finished specimens and allowed us to talk little about our involvement.

Restoring the skull of Texas Nessie

It's not just your imagination, we have been EXTREMELY busy in the lab and 3D department working on all sorts of new reconstructions of animals. I'm very proud of this next one, which debuted at the TPI booth during the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology annual meeting in Minneapolis this past fall.

The completed polycotylid skull

This skull belongs to a fantastic specimen of polycotylid plesiosaur excavated in 1991 by Mike Donovan, a collector working in the Eagle Ford Shale of Texas. After Donovan passed away, this specimen was donated to the Heard Museum in McKinney, just outside of Dallas. Shortly thereafter we were contracted to mount the original skeleton for display. You should really check it out, my friend Pamela Riddle made the custom mural that's the background for it and I think it looks spectacular. Several paleontologists are working on the description of this animal, and I hope to see the finished paper out soon.

Photo of the display from www.nbcdfw.com

Fast forward to November 2023: Evan, our 3D Director, drove with me down to Dallas for a few projects. In addition to getting to meet up with Pamela at the Perot Museum prep lab we also were able to visit the Heard in order to work on the skull. Darlene Summerfelt was gracious in accommodating us even though she had a touch of a cold a the time. Taking the specimen off of display was a stressful experience, since the real skull bones were mounted individually around a steel armature and plastic casts filling in the reconstruction. 

Darlene (L) and Evan (C) working on the skull as museum visitors observe

We scanned all of the original material and carefully reassembled the skull onto the mount in just one day. That, it turns out, was the easy part. Once back in Colorado we consulted with plesiosaur experts as well as with our own virtual 3D library of plesiosaur material to digitally reconstruct the skull of the animal. Special thanks to Mike Polcyn for letting me pick his brain.

Evan scanning reconstructed jaw parts in the Heard Museum

As you can see, even when the skull is completed, there was a lot of distortion from being buried under Texas for nearly 90 million years. Luckily we were able to remove this deformation. In the old days, during the 2004/5 reconstruction of the Martinectes (formerly Dolichorhynchops bonneri skull, this was done by making plastic casts and then heating and bending them, with lots of manual sculpting, to get them to resemble what they looked like in life, a difficult and time consuming process. 

Early reconstruction work showing the crushed-down top of skull

Once done with that we were able to print out a copy of the completed skull, which I got the privilege to assemble. Working with these highly detailed prints isn't the easiest thing to do, but I've had some pretty good experience with this reconstructing the BCT Teratophoneus skull, the mosasaur Jormungandr, as well as quite a few secret upcoming projects that you'll have to stay tuned for. 

The assembled print of the top of the skull, with me for scale

This one has made it back to Texas for the Heard Museum to put onto display (the Heard's Darlene Summerfelt for scale in this photo). She says she loves the reconstruction. Now that it's available through the www.trieboldpaleontology.com we hope other museums are just as impressed and order one today!

Darlene Summerfelt with the full size (and mini) skull reconstructions

Pete III finished. For now.

Just for the weekend, the prototype cast of our Daspletosaurus Pete III (RMDRC 06-005) will be shown off in the atrium of the museum, before it gets decent photographs and heads to its forever home. Yes, it has a 2006 specimen number.

The original site as found/explored in July 2005. We were so young.

We've been working on this for a decade. I'm not sure if I should take the day off to celebrate, or take advantage of the free time of getting a huge project off my plate and start something new and exciting. In the meantime, enjoy some of the snowy photos, better well-lit ones to come in a week.

So, this is what a pile of Daspletosaurus looks like

It just looks like such a fast critter, not like dumpy Tyrannosaurus

Nearly 11m of birdy goodness

Daspletosaurus reconstruction progressing: Pete III

You know, I think I'm just going to share some pictures as an update to my last blog post. We'll keep the reading part short and sweet. Restoration is coming along well. The skull is up next, and in the meantime we have the leg finished and the arms almost there. Lots more to come over the next few months. It's always good to have new tyrannosaur stuff to play with.

Pete III's scaps and arms

The scapulae were remarkably well preserved in 3D

Left leg before paint

After paint, left leg from the rear

Side view, the leg is HUGE!

Helping with museum renovations

I'm a little late to the party, but I wanted to share this link: http://uwgeomuseumrenovations.blogspot.com/2012/05/updates-on-renovations-happening-at-uw.html

A few years back, a crew from TPI took down the Apatosaurus skeleton from the University of Wyoming Geological Museum, reprepared and stabilized the bones, then remounted the skeleton in a more modern (non tail-dragging) pose. Recently the museum has been slated for renovations/asbestos abatement so I was sent up to help Dr. Kelli Trujillo and Bill Turner remove the tail (and a Pteranodon cast, and also an Allosaurus, at least in part) from display so work on the museum could commence.

The tail will be back on display later this year, just in case anyone is concerned. It should be viewed as a minor miracle that I actually made it that far up on a scissor lift. I don't do heights well. You can see a complete cast of this Apatosaurus on display at the RMDRC.

Come on down!

We've finished installing new specimens in the RMDRC's display hall just in time for the holiday weekend. Come by and see the new Appalaciosaurus skeleton, the dromaeosaurus, or maybe even the orca or dugong!

The long-armed tyrannosaur

RMDRC on VOA

We were filmed for a Voice of America feature a while back, and now it is online. Judging by the length of my hair I'd assume it was during field season.

New Turtle Display Almost Done!

I just wanted everyone to know our new surrogate marine hall is about finished and ready to open, hopefully for this (cold) weekend. We've got quite a turtle-heavy display, featuring skeletons of Archelon, Protostega, Toxochelys, Prionochelys and the shell of Bothremys. Also on display is a mosasaur-bitten Toxochelys shell, RMDRC 08-003 "Kraigums" that I discovered last spring, as well as the only real bones of Megalocoelacanthus dobiei on public display anywhere, the youngest fossil coelacanth found. There are also many more marine touch stations too. Please stop by and let us know what you think!