Internet Blamed for increase in Fossil Thefts

Officials from the American Bureau of Land Management (BLM) are blaming the Internet and the web auctions for an increase in vertebrate fossil thefts from public land in the United States.

Federal officials from the BLM in conjunction with the local law enforcement agencies are investigating another incident of stealing fossilised dinosaur bones in what has been termed a “brazen theft” from what was thought to be a secret location in Central Utah where a team of scientists were excavating a number of specimens.

Sadly, such incidents are becoming increasingly common as amateurs and other fossil prospectors try to extract fossils, either for their own collections but more likely to sell on at a huge profit.

Experts say the raid on the Utah location is another glaring example of fossil theft, a widespread problem in the age of the Internet, where auction sites and specialist forums for fossil sales are common place.

Speaking on behalf of the BLM, paleontologist Scott Foss said, “the theft like this, it happens quite a bit. And when it does, it’s very tragic.”

Foss doesn’t want us to say where the theft occurred.  However, he was prepared to meet reporters at a separate location, where a team of scientists are working on another dinosaur discovery.  At this site, he explained to journalists how the palaeontologists carefully excavate the precious fossils and then protect them with burlap and plaster jackets to protect the exposed parts of the fossil from bad weather and as preparation for lifting and removal.

Commenting on the fossil theft Mr Foss stated: “the thieves found some of these jackets. Whether it was malicious or just curiosity, they removed the jackets.  Some bones were stolen and some of the bones that were left behind were vandalised”.

What would somebody do with stolen dinosaur bones? Sadly there are plenty of people around ready to pay large sums of money to get their hands on a rare specimen.  For Foss, he had heard of fossils being sold for up to $20,000.

Fossils are commonly sold on eBay, on private collector Web sites, and sites run by commercial companies. But the BLM suspects much of the merchandise is stolen from public land.

Under U.S. legislation, collecting fossils is allowed on public land for personal use if the fossils are remnants of plants, such as petrified wood, or of invertebrate animals, such as trilobites, ammonites or belemnites.

However, collecting with the sole intention of selling is not allowed.

For dinosaur-related fossils on public land, even dinosaur footprints, it’s against the law to collect them at all.

“Vertebrate fossils cannot be sold legally if they came from public lands. There are no exceptions to that rule,” Foss said.

The BLM says many Internet buyers either don’t realise or don’t care that they’re encouraging theft of treasures owned by the public.   Such acts not only deny scientists the opportunity to carefully remover and study a fossil, but also deny the public from ever seeing that fossil on display.

On private land there are no laws against collecting and selling fossils.  Buying fossils on sites such as EBay can be fraught with problems, especially for the unwary.  Although there are a number of genuine and legitimate retailers, our own team members at Everything Dinosaur have come across incidents of fossils not turning out to be quite what they seem.  Crocodile teeth have been readily passed off as Spinosauridae and some of the descriptions given have at the very least been very misleading.

Thieves can expect harsh punishments from the U.S. if they are caught and the same can be said for the dealers and sellers too.

Everything Dinosaur sells a range of models that represent iconic animals from the fossil record, including dinosaur models: Dinosaur Models.

The Porcine Era – Lystrosaurs Ruled the World

An article recently published in the UK shed further light into the dominance of the lystrosaurs in the Early Triassic after much of the terrestrial life had been wiped out by the Permian mass extinction.  The cause of this mass extinction event is not clear, but the devastation it caused at the end of the Permian is very evident from the fossil record.  Approximately 57% of marine families, especially those from low latitudes became extinct.  Virtually all types of coral died out and reef life was decimated.  The trilobites, those wonderful arthropods that had been around since the Cambrian, disappeared as did the last of the eurypterids (sea-scorpions).  Sea lilies, brachipods, bivalves and gastropods suffered huge losses.  On land; things were not much better as many groups of amphibians and reptiles also perished.  Scientists estimate that 70% of all vertebrate genera living on land went extinct.

To read a related article on the Permian extinction and its effect on diaspid evolution and the development of the dinosaurs: Dinosaur Divergence – Long before the end of the Triassic.

Lystrosaurs were dicynodonts, short-tailed synapsid reptiles whose descendants were eventually to give rise to the mammals.  Typically, these type of animals had short skulls, with a deep, powerful jaw, high nostrils and broad but stumpy limbs.  This particular group of animals seems to have recovered very quickly following the Permian extinction event and rapidly diversified to become the dominant large, terrestrial life form.

There is evidence to suggest that these animals were mainly herbivorous (although other species may have been ominvores).  The presence of tusks in the strong jaws, coupled with the strong forelimbs indicate that these animals may have dug up roots and even excavated burrows and dens.  Perhaps this subterranean existence helped these animals survive the Permian extinction event.

It has been speculated that lystrosaurs were able to hibenate or enter into a period of dormancy (estivation).  This behaviour would have helped these relatively large animals survive a severe dry season for example.  Some species of these mammal-like reptiles grew into giants.  Fossils of Placerias, excavated from the petrified forest area of Arizona indicate animals as large as 3 metres long and weighing over 1,000 kilogrammes.

A replica of the large dicynodont Placerias.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

However, most of these types of animals went extinct themselves at the end of the Triassic, losing their “dead clade walking” tag as applied by many palaeontologists.  The cynodonts themselves as a group survived until the end of the Jurassic.

Mystery still surrounds the causes of the Permian extinction and no doubt many more papers will be published examining the potential causes and the effects on fauna and flora.  One thing is for sure, the Lystrosaurs with their jaws adapted for eating plants seized on the evolutionary opportunity and rapidly filled the ecological spaces vacated by extinct animals.  It has been estimated that these animals were so successful that something like 50% of all large land animals were lystrosaurs 240 million years ago.

To read a related article shedding light on a new theory regarding the Permian mass extinction: Can snails and oysters provide a clue to mass extinction events?

The CollectA Deluxe range includes a replica of a lystrosaur plus an archosaur that may have been the dominant predator in the environment.  To view the CollectA Deluxe range of figures: CollectA Deluxe Scale Prehistoric Animal Models.