09/25/2026
MORE RAPTOR BONES: These neck vertebrae were cleaned up over the past week and are from our Stenonychosaurus skeleton. Stenonychosaurus was a large "raptor" dinosaur, actually a kind of Troodontid which were closely related to the more famous Velociraptor and Deinonychus raptors, but had smaller foot claws, generally short arms, long legs and lots of small teeth. It is thought that troodontids were fast-footed predators, specializing in smaller prey.
We have an increasing amount of this skeleton. However, as with most of the skeletons from Jack's Bonebed, the bones are scattered over a wide area. We now have over half the neck, some skull bones, tail bones, leg and foot bones of this skeleton, but undoubtedly there is more in the cliff!
Skeletons of small carnivores like this are much more rare than the big predators like tyrannosaurs. This is going to be an important specimen!
(BTW: next week we're rolling our big new skull into the lab to be cleaned. That one is going to amaze you!).
Collected from US Public Lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management - Montana/Dakotas. From "Jack's Bonebed" found in 2019 by Jack Wilson. Specimens prepared by Deanna Neff and Dyllon Thompson (partial). From the middle Dinosaur Park Formation (equivalent), Late Cretaceous, Montana.
(note that the paleoartist's name is not a typo, it has two D's!)
