This week I have a specimen that is pretty distinctive for you to have a go at identifying, so it should prove pretty straightforward for anyone who has seen one of these before:
Of course, if you haven’t seen one of these before it may be a bit more of a challenge!
You can put your suggestions, observations and questions below and I’ll do my best to reply. Good luck!
Zygoma 
T………. m…….?
or D d ?
yes T m
The proportions don’t look quite right for T.m. — it looks slightly thinner, less chunky. I’m going for T.i.
I agree, not quite T.m. T.i. is a good guess but I’m going to go so far as say T.p.!
I didn’t check T.p. as its status as a separate species is questionable, but I think you could be right.
A Sirenian mandible would be my best guess, so respect to those of you who can discuss identification to species level!
I second Ric! My guess would have been even simpler than Sirenian: something marine because of the peg tooth and how robust the jaw looks.
Bizarrely I saw a skull of one of these mammals displayed in the window of a fishmonger’s shop in Whitby in 2007!
I’d go with it being T. m., but don’t hold me to that. So hard to tell without being able to make proper comparisons. And Google image search can only find me pictures of the skulls of two species of T!
I’d like it to be a D.d. which is one of my favourite skulls apart from platypus. But if not its from the S family ?
Manatee?? 😀
Fortunately, I have seen one before, so it’s pretty easy to get it down to the genus! The exact species is, of course, rather more difficult. Perhaps I should head to the online bookstore?
T.i. ?