Seattle’s Burke Museum is sharing videos of staff cleaning a sub-adult hadrosaur skull. The dinosaur, identified as Edmontosaurus annectens, was found in Montana and is estimated at about 20 feet long; googly eyes mark where its eyes are believed to have been.
The hadrosaur was buried in a sandy streambed with plant remains. The museum identified one as a 65-million-year-old palm frond and said such fine preservation is rare in sand. Based on more complete plant records from nearby sites, researchers believe the area was warm, wet and swampy, similar to today’s Mississippi River delta.
Fossil prep lab manager Kelsie Abrams said fossils can break during handling because they are fragile, and staff sometimes deliberately separate jumbled bones to rebuild a skeleton. The team uses glue to mend breaks and photographs and records fossils to document their condition.
