Rare fossil find of Missouri dinosaurs

[Brocc21]

It's always nice to see new finds of Appalachian fauna. Especially when it comes from my home state of Missouri. The on going dig has found some new specimens of Missouri's own official state dinosaur Parrosaurus Missouriensis (Formally Hypsibema Missouriensis).

https://nypost.com/2021/11/24/bones-of-new-dinosaur-species-discovered-in-missouri/

[Newt]

Nice! Appalachian dinosaurs for the win!


I did a little research, as all the news articles I could find were scant on details. Apparently this locale has been studied off and on since the 1940s. Besides Parrosaurus, it has yielded the turtles Adocus, Naomichelys, and "Trionyx" - the first two are typical Late Cretaceous turtles of Laramidia, while the third is a wastebasket used for indeterminate softshell remains. It is interesting that these freshwater taxa are found on both sides of the Western Interior Seaway (assuming the fossils are correctly assigned). Some crocodilian scraps were assigned to cf. Leidyosuchus; I suspect they would be reassigned to Borealosuchus if restudied. Indeterminate gar and ray fossils were also found. This is interesting because it indicates that the site was deposited in a freshwater habitat, and that the dinosaurs may not have been transported far. This is rare for Appalachia; most dinosaur remains from the subcontinent are known from marine deposits and presumably represent carcasses that drifted out to sea (which is part of why Appalachian dinosaurs are usually so scrappy). So hopefully more relatively complete dinosaurs will be found here.


https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/84925362.pdf#page=55

[Halichoeres]

Hey, maybe the eastern half of the country can stop having Colorado envy!