Another set of fossils boxed up and ignored for years at the University of Alberta only to reveal that they are the bones of a mysterious unkown prehistoric mammal.Few dozen fossils all that's left of one of Alberta's first mammal
Gee blow the dust off those boxes and check under the ping pong tables and see what else you can find guys. This is typical of all museums, they have boxes and boxes of 'stuff' no-one has bothered to look through, let alone catalouge and classify.
New critter solves ancient puzzle Actually that headline is misleading the critter actually creates a new puzzle, what was it?
Most confounding are the animal's teeth, which resemble in superficial ways, those of primitive relatives of ungulates, the group of mammals which includes horses and cows. But despite that link to ungulates, which are traditionally herbivores, Horolodectes was thought to have dined on small insects and grubs. "It had sharp crests on the teeth which formed blades, indicating it was likely carnivorous," said Craig Scott, a PhD candidate and lead author of the study. Horolodectes means 'hourglass biter', in reference to the creature's peculiar hourglass-shaped pre-molars, the teeth between the canine and the molars. The very tall, sharp pre-molars are unlike any others so far discovered in the mammal world. "There is nothing else with teeth quite like it," Craig said. Researchers give name to ancient mystery creature
For the first time, researchers at the University of Alberta have been able to put a name and a description to an ancient mammal that still defies classification. See
Dinosuars
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