Spinosaurus fossils probably from Morocco allegedly for sale on Facebook

[MLMjp]

Don't ask me why, but lately I have been obsessed with Spinosaurus, to the point of constantly googling about the few fossils we have of it.
Ignoring the question whether to not I should be doing this so often, I just happen to found this article thanks to the image of the fossil. It is from last year, but I think is worth talking about.
https://en.yabiladi.com/articles/details/57013/fossils-spinosaurus-aegypticus-probably-found.html

That jaw is so similar to the one in the Spinosaurus holotype.

[Simon]

Its a tough question, with a couple of different parts to consider:

(Disclaimer:  I personally cannot fathom why someone would want to have a real dinosaur fossil or skeleton in their personal possession.  If I somehow got ahold of such an item I would take it to a museum the same day.  It only helps to elevate humanity's base of knowledge about prehistoric animals if it is STUDIED and shared with the public.)

Having gotten that out of the way, the contrarians would say something along the lines of:

"Well, if private investors didn't pay to have the fossils dug up, we might have never found them."

OK.  This is a fair comment IF you are talking about those fellows in the Black Hills who dug up the "Dueling Dinosaurs" skeletons.  They actually had people trained in fossil removal and preparation to do the job (though the fossil is still unstudied, as they obviously got a bit too greedy in terms of what they tried to auction it off for a few years back).

*BUT*

And it is a BIG *BUT*:

For every private fossil collector like those Black Hills guys, there are probably HUNDREDS (if not thousands) of people dynamiting fossils, destroying them in the process, in the hope of earning a quick dollar - IN THE DEVELOPING WORLD.

How many valuable fossils have been destroyed in this fashion in places such as Morocco, or Mongolia, where the people are poor (so don't blame them), in order to satisfy the Western private market fueled by Maroons - yes, I am being judgmental here -  like a certain well-known Hollywood actor who paid a couple of million $$ for a Tarbosaur skull?

Answer:  We don't know, but its probably more than those of us who care could stomach to find out.

If there was no such private market, the fossil "grave diggers" would move on, because there'd be no money in it, leaving the field to qualified scientists/excavators.

Does that mean that some of these fossils would never see the light of day because they'd never be found?

Probably.  But the damage that is being done through the wanton destruction of fossils by unscrupulous "fossil grave diggers" probably outweighs any loss to science from that lack of discovery - by several orders of magnitude.

That's my take.  I used to be more ambivalent about it, because I respect private property rights.  But there have to be exceptions.  Fossils are NOT a "renewable resource" that you can just re-grow like you can a tree to make up for the one you cut down, after all.  And the knowledge gleaned from them is only valuable if it is shared with humanity....

[Pachyrhinosaurus]

Keep in mind that Morocco is known for its fake fossils. As a collector, I'm always skeptical of any material coming from Morocco.

[Sim]

I'm reminded of this Spinosaurus specimen I saw on Wikipedia which is said to be a "Reconstructed subadult skeleton from a private collection": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Spinoface.jpg

I don't know how much of this specimen is real.  I noticed though that its hindlimbs look like the small ones in the famous specimen/reconstruction from 2014, but the photo of this privately owned specimen was put on Wikipedia in 2010!  So maybe this is a specimen that showed actual Spinosaurus hindlimbs years before the specimen from 2014, but being in a private collection prevented people from learning about this.  It would be interesting to see what its torso looks like from the side as this is a part of Spinosaurus that is still not known (the length of the body and the complete shape of the ridge on its back), and I doubt the extremely long body in the 2014 reconstruction is correct.  While looking at the photo I linked to to see if it might contain any other real parts of Spinosaurus that are considered "unknown", I noticed that its forelimbs seem a bit... smaller than how they are usually restored on Spinosaurus?  If I'm remembering right, almost nothing is known about the forelimbs of Spinosaurus at least from non-private specimens.  I wonder if the forelimbs in that private specimen are real and if at some point in the future it will become known that Spinosaurus had slightly smaller forelimbs than was previously thought.

[amargasaurus cazaui]

There is also some oversimplification being offered here . It is not a one size fits all discussion. It is fun to talk about taking every dinosaur and every skeleton to a museum, but then there is simple reality. First, most museums lack the space and resources for many new specimens and displays so often peoples generous gifts to them get stored in boxes, flats or cabinets that will never be seen nor studied by anyone.
    Chinese dinosaur eggs are a perfect example of this discussion...often Chinese dignitaries would hand the eggs out as gifts for visiting or foreign officials, etc. When you see the sheer size and magnitude for instance of the xixian egg nesting areas and realize how deeply underground they extend you can understand there are literaly billions of eggs that will go uncollected, and slowly left to weather out and return to the elements.
    The same can be offered for many of the more well known species and or sites where skeletons are found. The Como Bluffs area is a prime example for instance with so much float or lose dinosaur bone at the surface that will never be properly identified or studied, that a cabin there was made from pieces of it. When you walk those hills and around those quarries where Marsh and Cope found so many Jurassic dinosaurs you can see sauropods weathering out of the ground and cliff faces everywhere...they are all far too massive and require  far too much work to remove and belong to well studied species.So now and then when the collection and or sale of one of those specimens is allowed I am happy.Better it be removed and saved for future generations than allowed to crumble to dust.
   I do think that such excavations should be by permit only and overseen by a state paleo to insure nothing is lost of scientific value.
   Owning a skeleton or specimen from a well known, well studied and common species is no crime, nor is it harmful to anyone...of course owning a large section of Spinosaurus hardly qualifies in the same context.
   I own a Psittacosaurus myself, legally obtained and quite common at least ten years ago. Now the supply has dried up, and the market has soared, but there were hundreds of them brought to market ......I would never consider giving it a museum unless or until I pass away because there are literally thousands of them already in museums and it just isn't that big of deal.  I do use mine for various educational show and so forth during the year...but it is overkill to think every dinosaur skeleton everywhere has to be in museum .

[Reptilia]

like a certain well-known Hollywood actor who paid a couple of million $$ for a Tarbosaur skull?

Didn't know that, who's the actor in question?

[SBell]

like a certain well-known Hollywood actor who paid a couple of million $$ for a Tarbosaur skull?

Didn't know that, who's the actor in question?

Nicholas Cage! Because of course it was.

And a couple other points--it'snot just the developing world where people destroy context (and fossils) for the 'payday' parts that sell (teeth, claws). Where I am, fossils are heavily regulated--but even active sites have been literally sledgehammered into oblivion by vandals to collect the teeth. Because, yeah, there is a market.

And the idea that museums keep specimens in a box when they are donated is true but not the full story--no museum displays everything. For every mount or display of specimens, even a mid-size museum could have hundreds to thousands of other specimens in storage. But this doesn't mean they are 'wasted'. Instead, they are identified, cataloged and made available to study to researchers from around the world for a variety of reasons. We learn a lot more from a range of specimens than from just one--and every single one that ends up on a mantle or in someone's basement is thousands of data points that we will never know.

And I'm pretty sure the 'eggs as gifts' is long past. Seeing as China (and Mongolia) has had ridiculously stringent laws in place since the mid-20th century (thanks, Roy Chapman Andrews...). Which is why it's pretty easy to tell when fossils were poached from those regions--they usually are (even if a Florida seller tries to claim that they're from the UK...because someone shipped them there first...)!

[amargasaurus cazaui]

like a certain well-known Hollywood actor who paid a couple of million $$ for a Tarbosaur skull?

Didn't know that, who's the actor in question?

Nicholas Cage! Because of course it was.

And a couple other points--it'snot just the developing world where people destroy context (and fossils) for the 'payday' parts that sell (teeth, claws). Where I am, fossils are heavily regulated--but even active sites have been literally sledgehammered into oblivion by vandals to collect the teeth. Because, yeah, there is a market.

And the idea that museums keep specimens in a box when they are donated is true but not the full story--no museum displays everything. For every mount or display of specimens, even a mid-size museum could have hundreds to thousands of other specimens in storage. But this doesn't mean they are 'wasted'. Instead, they are identified, cataloged and made available to study to researchers from around the world for a variety of reasons. We learn a lot more from a range of specimens than from just one--and every single one that ends up on a mantle or in someone's basement is thousands of data points that we will never know.

And I'm pretty sure the 'eggs as gifts' is long past. Seeing as China (and Mongolia) has had ridiculously stringent laws in place since the mid-20th century (thanks, Roy Chapman Andrews...). Which is why it's pretty easy to tell when fossils were poached from those regions--they usually are (even if a Florida seller tries to claim that they're from the UK...because someone shipped them there first...)!

Perhaps your experiences are different being from another country but in the United states its a very mixed story. Museums here are struggling for funding and simply lack staff to label and catalog anything and rely heavily on volunteers that are often not highly trained scientists. I remember standing in the Denver museum of nature and science a few years back watching an older man meticoulously etching away at a few large vert encased in matrix. I sat and chatted with him as he worked a few hours...apparently the museum relies heavily on volunteers to work the load of prep needing done. There is always a backlog...
I remember one of the more fascinating images in the book published a few years ago by national Geographic was the pictures under the sports arena and facilities at Brigham Young university showing thousands of jacketed, uncataloged and unsorted specimens brought in mostly from Mesa Quarry by Jensen. In short, some museums handle the workload while others simply cannot...
   I belong to a mineral and fossil group based out of the nearest larger city. Often an older member will pass away and leave their collection to the club to find a suitable use for. Often these are lifetime accumulations of rare and priceless specimens ....the club used to donate them to various museums only to find the facilities would have "flat" sales or place the better pieces in the gift shop and move them along for a profit. The reasoning is consistent...not enough  space, not enough staff, not enough time , not enough display area, and lack of funding.
People have entire basements full of trilobites, sharks teeth, and fossil fish....a lot depends on context. Here in Kansas we routinely have solid sheets of limestone seafloor covered in shells that are amazing. They are common and I could show you areas of lakebed hundreds of feet wide you can collect to your hearts content....
In western Kansas, the layer marker most commonly found in the chalks is sharks teeth.....you can find an exposed cut and screen out hundreds in a few days with a little work. They are common, but for those who do not have access to them, they might seem rare.
  My psittacosaurus comes from a small area in Eastern China where they are so commonly found they are the areas boundary fossil and are so named for the small town nearby (Meileyingensia) I have seen slabs containing more than 50 of these dinosaurs....they are the single most commonly collected dinosaur species from China. My specimen had been legally shipped out of China from a gift shop and into Europe years ago.
   Such practice was commonplace and the norm for tourists. When Britain allowed their 99 year lease on Hong Kong to expire in 2009, that was the turning point. Up until then peasants would bring their fossils to Hong Kong and from there out into the world market. If anything was done illegally you were prosecuted by British law,  basically a slap on the wrist. Once China took over they imposed their own laws and removing fossils became a capital offense. The US that year signed a letter of "Agreement"with china prohibiting the import of said fosils, at which point and only then did it become illegal.
   Regarding the egg trade it flourished well right up until 2009. The practice of gifting foreigners and dignitaries was especially pronounced during the Nixon administration in the US.....and continued for quite some time. Most people are familiar with Baby Louie for instance...found in a block of material sourced from China. Most may not know however the block was given to an American geologist as a gift for helping survey and assess mineral resources for the government there, apparently by some local official. Once he returned to the US he realized the rock contained young or newly hatched dinosaurs and eggs and approached Stonemason, who did much of the prep and was actively involved in notifying the scientific community and getting the specimen studied, and famous.
His name was Charlie Magovern, and himself was recently brought up on charges of illegal activities relating to dinosaur fossils from China. Hard to verify the origins of the piece because when it left china the laws were still quite gray and the fossil trade was considered legitimate. What we do know about Charlie himself is he operates several traveling exhibits about dinosaur eggs, and fosils and was considered somewhat of a central figure in the dinosaur egg culture. It has only been within the last few years he was indicted...the laws are not as cut and dry as you think they are, and even though now they are quite well stated that has only been the case since 2009.
   My fossils do not represent lost data points, those points were lost when someone in china dug the fossils and brought them to market years ago. . My ownership has little effect since it occurred years after the fact, legally and as allowed by full US laws, using US customs and processes.
   Context is important within any discussion on the topic and trying to argue a one size fits all cases does not work sadly. Noone would complain about lost data points for a shell collection or fossil sponges, or for that matter crinoids...because they are common.
Discussion seems to be branching from the spinosaurid fossil , and might perhaps be split off if the admins wish...

[Syndicate Bias]

if i had 2 million id buy a real Giganotosaurus skull, it probably would go for 10 seeing as its probably the biggest skluu next to the carcharodontosaurus