By Justine Kelsie

New sites and fossils being discovered in the Peace Country

Aug 13, 2018 | 3:17 PM

Paleontologists have been busy in the Peace Country this summer. 

Tyrannosaur teeth and a graveyard of duck-billed dinosaurs called Hadrosaur are among discoveries dug up by crews. Local and international paleontologists have been digging in four sites, including the Pipestone Creek bonebed, as well as some newly discovered areas, and a rediscovered site. 

Dr. Matt White from the University of New England came over from Australia for three weeks to work as part of Dr. Phil Bell’s field team. He had the opportunity to dig in an area called “Dead Falls”.

“The best fossil site I have ever seen. I was like a kid in a school ground. I was running up and down the bank with bones coming out everywhere. It was about an hour hike to get down there to this bonebed and it was about two-metres thick with bones sticking out,” White explained.

The paleontologist was also able to visit a site called “Spring Creek”, which is a juvenile Hadrosaur bonebed.

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“It had all of these cute little jaws and little limb elements that are only five to ten-centimetres long. Their main aim was to find the skull material. Those have really diagnostic features which can identify a new species,” said White. 

Excavations continue throughout the Peace with Canadian paleontologists Dr. Derek Larson from the Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum, Dr. Matthew Vavrek from Grande Prairie Prairie Regional College, and Dr. Corwin Sullivan from the University of Alberta. Dr. Bell and Dr. Nicolas Campione from the University of New England (Australia) have also been involved in the work.