Friday mystery object #152 answer

Apologies for the late posting today – I’m on holiday and haven’t had a chance to post until now.

On Friday I gave you this object to identify:

It was immediately recognised as a primate by everyone, which is unsurprising, given the very characteristic enclosed bony orbits and set of four incisors in the premaxilla and mandible. The teeth were also commented upon by henstridgesj, who recognised that this is an Old World Monkey (Cercopithecidae), with two premolars on each side in both the maxilla and mandible.

Some people might argue with the classification of this specimen as a member of the Cercopithecidae, since the lack of a tail suggests that it’s an Ape of some sort, but the Hominoidea form a smaller clade within the wider Cercopithecidae clade, which means that this is both an Ape and an Old World Monkey.

The kind of Ape is a more tricky question, although the shape of the teeth and the size of the braincase in relation to the facial region rules out any adult Great Apes (Hominidae) – it could be a juvenile, but the degree of fusion of the bones says not. That leaves the ‘Lesser Apes’ (Hylobatidae) or Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #151 answer

On Friday I gave you this object to identify:

There were fewer comments than usual, but those comments were impressively observant.

Lena got stuck in, identifying the element as a long, thin ungulate humerus and narrowing it down to a camelid. Mikolaj Lisowski noticed the low proximal epiphysis (the end of the bone that is connected to the shoulder) and suggested that it might belong to a Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #150 answer

Normally Monday mornings are the time that the answer to the mystery object is posted on my blog, but this weekend I’ve been involved in the Enlightenment Cafe, which has meant I’ve been too busy to write the usual full answer. Here are a couple of images of me doing my bit in the show (photo on stage courtesy of @sillypunk):

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But excuses for tardiness aside, here is the mystery object I would have been writing a proper answer for if I wasn’t on a stage talking to a room full of people:

You all spotted that it was a type of canid (dog) straight away, but the species was a little bit more tricky. Many went for a fox of some kind, as it is quite a small specimen, but Barbara Powell, Jamie Revell and Ethan plumped for the correct answer of Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #149 answer

On Friday I gave you a bit of a spot-the-difference with these two skulls, wanting to know if they were two individuals from the same species or if they were from two different species:

I must say that it was a bit of a tricky identification without the added complexity of a between specimen comparison, yet you all did remarkably well.

As usual Jake was the first to comment, correctly identifying that the specimens are both rodents and squirrels at that. He also recognised that both were adult animals, although one was probably older than the other when it died, based on the degree of wear on the teeth (assuming the diet was similar). The squirrel identification was also supported by Will, henstridgesj, Dave Godfrey, Jamie Revell and Barbara Powell.

Barbara also picked up on the feature that made me consider that these specimens may have been from different species – the sutures between the premaxilla, maxilla, nasals and frontal bones that make up the rostrum (the nosey bit). This is something that Lena and Jamie Revell also commented upon.

The position of the sutures (or junctions) between the various bones that make up the rostrum can certainly be useful in diagnosing differences between species – it’s a handy one for distinguishing between Lions and Tigers for example:

However, in this case I don’t think that the differences between the sutures are all that diagnostic, I think the differences may simply be down to either sexual dimorphism (that’s where males and females of the same species develop differently) or differences between the ages of the individuals. In fact, given that the specimen with the more heavily worn teeth is smaller and less robust than the other specimen I wouldn’t be surprised if it was an older female and younger male of the same species that are being compared.

One of the reasons I don’t think the sutures are diagnostic comes down to timing of their fusion. According to Wilson & Sánchez-Villagra, 2009 the pattern of closure of the cranial sutures in rodents follows a fairly standard pattern, with the rostral elements being amongst the last to fuse. This suggests that those sutures are more likely to vary between animals of different ages and between animals with different life histories. That said, there are geographical variations in this species, so these specimens may represent individuals of different subspecies from different parts of the range – something I can’t check because there is no locality information with them (at least not that I’ve found yet).

With the spot-the-difference dealt with, I will leave you with the correct species identification as made by henstridgesj, these are the skulls of Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #148 answer

On Friday I gave you this object to identify:

As usual Jake was in like a shot with a correct general identification of whale vertebra. However, identifying what kind of vertabra and what species of whale is a more tricky prospect. The type of vertebra was narrowed down quite quickly by Jake, henstridgesj , Barbara Powell and Kevin K, all of whom agreed that it was one of the cervical (or neck) vertebrae.

Now the neck vertebrae in whales are odd. All mammals have seven vertebrae in their necks (even Giraffes), but whale neck vertebrae are a bit odd as in many whale species they tend to be fused together (as Barbara Powell pointed out). This makes sense when you think about how whales behave – they don’t need to turn their heads much, so having separated vertebrae is not necessary and may even cause problems considering the forces transmitted through the neck vertebrae during swimming, surfacing and feeding.

The pattern of fusion varies according to species and stage of development – some whales have no fusion, some have all of their neck vertebrae fused, others have the atlas (the first cervical that articulates with the skull) free and the other six vertebrae fused and yet others have the atlas, axis (the second cervical that the atlas pivots on) and the next four cervical vertebrae fused and the seventh and last cervical free. Just to complicate matters young whales start off with all of the vertebrae free and they fuse as the animal develops, which means that a young animal will not conform to the adult form.

In light of this situation, the mystery object becomes rather tricky to identify without being able to see the amount of fusion or other parts of the same specimen that may indicate developmental stage. That just leaves us with size and shape to go on, which is a bit problematic unless you have a suitable reference to compare this specimen against.

As it turns out I was unable to find a decent set of images for comparison and we don’t have much whale material at the Horniman. This means I’ve been a bit stumped in trying to identify this specimen – particularly since it came to us with the limited description ‘Vertebra of Whale’.

The size, shape and fusion suggest to me that it is from one of the large Oceanic Dolphins (Delphinidae), such as a Pilot Whale or Killer Whale. This would agree with Barbara Powell’s suggestion, but it would disagree with an identification that was made by a marine mammal expert who has helped me with identifications in the collections in the past. He suggested that this vertebra belonged to a Sperm Whale Physeter macrocephalus Linnaeus, 1758 – presumably a young individual, given the size, although that doesn’t really tally with the amount of fusion.

Apologies for the somewhat tentative outcome of this mystery object, but it serves as another example of the lack of certainty that we sometimes have to accept when trying to identify specimens – it can really be a pain in the neck.

Friday mystery object #147 answer

On Friday I gave you this object to identify:

I chose this object because it gave me a chance to take a photo using my new phone camera and a hand lens (inspired by an article by Nigel Larkin in the latest NatSCA News). I thought it might be a bit of a challenge, but I was proven wrong once again, as Jake tentatively identified the part of the skeleton this bone is from straight away – it is indeed a baculum or os penis (that’s the Latin for penis bone).

The species was a bit more difficult, but Barbara Powell was quick to identify that it came from a Mustelid and then there was a bit of disagreement between Barbara, Ric Morris and Dawn about whether it was from a Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #145 answer

Apologies for the somewhat tardy answer to the mystery object that I gave you on Friday. Not only is it tardy, it’s not really an answer, as I still haven’t ruled out all of the possible options as to what this skull is from:

Now I’m quite happy to say it’s from a member of the crow family or corvid of some sort, but there are quite a lot of corvids out there. My first thought was Jackdaw Corvus monedula (Linnaeus, 1758), which is also what Jake thought. However, when compared to the Jackdaw on the Skullsite the bone between the eyes looks too narrow.

Barbara Powell very helpfully provided some measurements from Jackdaws in her collection, that make me think that this may still be a Jackdaw, but I have reservations, since there are several other corvids with skulls in the same size range as this specimen (6.9 cm long). The Magpie Pica pica (Linnaeus, 1758) is one that was suggested by several people (biologycurator and Leigh) and henstridgesj suggested it could be one of the North American Jays.

The big problem here is that there aren’t many features of the skull of the corvids that help distinguish them from each other, apart from the size and the bill shape. However, Magpies and Jackdaws are a bit too similar in these features. Other characters may be able to help, such as the shape of the bones of the palate (which I think favours the Magpie), but without a large sample size for comparison it is hard to tell what variation is due to species differences and what is due to individual differences.

Given that this specimen is from the King’s or Chelsea College collection, which contains material from around the World, we can’t even rule out species from other countries. All of this makes identification a bit too uncertain, so for now I will simply keep the identification to ‘corvid’ and make a note of the various species it is most likely to be. Better to be uncertain than to be wrong.

Thanks for your help!

Friday mystery object #144 answer

On Friday I gave you another genuine mystery object from the Horniman’s collections:

It was in a box of unidentified and unlabelled bones which I’m pretty sure came from the King’s College teaching collection in the 1980s, when King’s merged with Chelsea College. Quite a large amount of material came to the Museum and unfortunately much of it was jumbled up, missing labels and quite often different parts from the same specimen had become separated.

I have been kept busy trying to make sense of it all, which is no small task, as the collection was mainly used for comparative anatomy meaning it is very diverse. The specimens in the collection could be from anything and from anywhere in the world – which makes it rather difficult to narrow down the options.

This specimen was a bit of a puzzle, since although it is clearly from a fairly large animal, it is quite hard to work out what the full adult size would be, as this bone is from a juvenile (as spotted by Kevin). This is apparent from the unfused ends of the bone (called the epiphyses).

One possibility that occurred to me (and Rhea) was that it may be the bone of an aquatic mammal, such as a seal. However, in aquatic mammals the humeri need to rotate, meaning that they tend to be flattened in two different planes at the proximal and distal ends. This bone is just flattened in one plane, meaning it wouldn’t be great for use in swimming efficiently and it wouldn’t be great for bearing large amounts of weight/force during locomotion – a more rounded cross-section of bone is better for that.

In fact, the general shape of the bone is wide and flat with large tuberosities for muscle attachment – almost like the humerus of a mole:

This is something that Richard Forrest seems to have picked up on when he suggested that it is the humerus of a fossorial [digging] animal. This narrows down the options quite nicely, as there are only a few large fossorial animals.

The Pangolin was suggested by Dave Godfrey, but the bone is too large. Dave also suggested the Aardvark, which is a good contender, although not quite right. I personally have a different animal in mind – Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #143 answer

On Friday I gave you another skull to identify from a box of unlabelled material dating from 1974:

At first glance it looks quite similar to the skull of a small dog or fox, but the muzzle area seems a bit short, the braincase too small and the teeth aren’t quite right for a canid – in fact the teeth look more like those of a mustelid (as Jake pointed out). However, mustelids tend to have quite broad and blocky skulls and this one seems a bit elongate and gracile.

Clare P made a very good suggestion when she suggested the Asian Palm Civet Paradoxurus hermaphroditus, although this animal is somewhat smaller than the species that this specimen came from. Size aside, the dentition matches pretty well (if you can work out which tooth sockets belong to each tooth):

So it looks like this is the skull of a viverrid. There are still lots of candidates out there and location could help narrow down possible species, but without any labels it can be hard to work out locality information. However, last week’s object was from the same collection and it was an African species, suggesting that Africa would be a good place to start looking for a species match.

Jamie Revell did just that when he suggested the Giant Forest Genet Genetta victoriae, which is a viverrid of about the right size from Africa. Although I already thought I knew what the specimen was, I took Jamie’s suggestion very seriously, as I hadn’t considered that particular species and it fit with most of the features of the specimen.

In the end an online French viverrid identification resource I’d not seen before provided me with the information I needed to exclude the Giant Forest Genet. Mainly it came down to whether the premaxillary bones made contact with the frontal bones – they do in the Giant Forest Genet, but they don’t in this specimen. Also, the area where the temporalis muscle attached is too narrow in this specimen.

In light of these observations and with reference to specimens in the Horniman’s collections (including one that I used as a mystery object a year ago) I am fairly confident in identifying this as Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #142 answer

On Friday I gave you this unidentified object from the Horniman’s collections and asked for your help in identifying it:

Suggestions ranged from the Easter Bunny (topical) to Dangermouse (fantastic), but there was a remarkably fast convergence of opinion on what this is.

Jamie Revell, Barbara Powell, henstridgesj and Jake all came to the conclusion that this is the skull of a Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #141 answer

On Friday I was in rather a rush as I was involved in co-organising this year’s Natural Science Collections Association (or NatSCA) conference. It was a very enjoyable (if hectic) few days of natural history nerdery, but left me limited time to select an object from the FMO. I took my opportunity at the drinks reception at the Grant Museum of Zoology where I tried out the camera on my new phone to get an image of this specimen:

Now it was a fairly easy one to identify as the skull of these animals is very distinctive. Nonetheless, if you haven’t seen the skull of one of these animals before it is a bit of an oddity, with that spike in the face and the apparently strongly protruding maxilla and mandible (which is actually due to unusually elevated frontals). Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #140 answer

On Friday I gave you this skull to identify:

I thought it would be an easy one and I wasn’t wrong, although several of you seemed to second-guess my intentions and assumed that I was trying to trick you because it seemed too easy.

The small second incisors (or peg-teeth) just behind the big first incisors were a complete give-away for the group of animals this skull came from – the Lagomorphs, which Jake spotted immediately.

Henstridgesj, Jamie Revell, Debi Linton and Jake all suggested that it came from a Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #139 answer

On Friday I gave you this object to identify:

It didn’t prove to be all that difficult, perhaps since the skull is distinctive in having the general appearance of a ruminant (in particular it is missing the upper incisors), but it also has canines and is very small, with a skull height of just over 5cm. This slightly unusual mixture of characters suggests one of the more primitive ruminants.

Jake suggested it might be a Muntjac or Chinese Water Deer, but as Lena pointed out, Muntjac (and Chinese Water Deer) have a scent gland in front of the eye (called a preorbital gland) that is housed in a big pocket in the skull. The skull itself is also a bit small even for a Muntjac.

Jack Ashby, Lena, Barbara Powell and Jamie Revell all managed to work out that this skull was from a member of the family Tragulidae. To be more specific it is from a Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #138 answer

On Friday I gave you this object to identify:

The idea was to provide a sense of how tricky it can be to identify bits of postcranial bone, even fairly characteristic bits like the humerus (which is what this is).

There were various suggestions, with sheep, goat and deer all getting a mention, but henstridgesj and Jake both got the same identification as the collector when they suggested Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #137 answer

On Friday I gave you this mystery object to identify:

Unfortunately I was unable to respond to comments on Friday, as my laptop had to go in for repairs and my phone has reached the end of its useful life as an internet device after 4 years faithful service. For the answer this week I had to drag out my old laptop, which has meant 2 hours of twiddling thumbs as the machine started up and dealt with various updates…

In some ways it was a good thing that I wasn’t able to comment, since it would have ruined the fun from the outset. Jake was straight in there, wondering if it was really as easy as it looked – and it was. Rachel, Jack Ashby and Barbara Powell also plumped for the right answer, while several others came very close when they went for a greedy relative. This is in fact the skull of a juvenile Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #136 answer

On Friday I gave you this skull to identify:

I think the oddly inflated and positioned auditory bullae make this look like Gary Oldman in his role as Dracula. Because of this characteristically odd feature the specimen was fairly easy to identify. Of course, that supposes that most people have seen the skull of one of these animals before…

Here is the skull in better detail (for future reference):

The front teeth were a good indication that it was a rodent (we’ve talked about that before) and with the big and upward pointing external auditory meatus (better known as ear-hole) it suggested a very big-eared rodent.

With a skull length of about 7cm the number of possible rodents decreased quite rapidly, as most are much too small to have such a big skull, so I wasn’t surprised when Barbara Powell and David Craven hinted that they had the answer. From then on I started getting cryptic answers about warm fur and cold faces as more of you worked out that this is the skull of a Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #135 answer

On Friday I gave you this object to identify:

I thought it might prove quite tricky, yet several of you managed to work out what it was and which animal it came from.

Jake spotted that it was from a young animal – as you can see from the unfused ends of the bone. He also noticed that it was a bit of a strange shape, a bit like a tibia, but actually a radius.

Barbara Powell suggested that it belonged to an animal built for power rather than speed and henstridgesj suggested one such critter – the Aardvark. Although that wasn’t right, or even close in terms of evolutionary relationships, it was very close from the perspective of functional adaptations.

After that it was a short step to the same answer that I decided on when I had to identify this piece of bone. Barabara Powell, henstridgesj and Steven D. Garber, PhD all converged on the answer of Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #134 answer

On Friday I gave you a very nice specimen from the Horniman Museum to identify:

I chose this partly because it’s a great mount and partly because I needed to check the identification, which was out of date.

You all did a great job of breaking down the various options – and there were a few. Jake made the comment:

Is it dippy or a bit ruff ?

This I took as a question about whether the specimen was a Kangaroo Rat (of the genus Dipodomys) or a Rufous Rat-kangaroo (Aepyprymnus rufescens). There was another interpretation that fit with the dippy clue – the correct Family name, which is Dipodidae.

Barbara Powell and Jamie Revell were in the right area and henstridgesj suggested J.j. which was pretty much there, assuming he meant Jaculus jaculus. It is in fact the skeleton of the Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #133 answer

Friday’s mystery object was meant to be a bit of a challenge:

Post-cranial bones can be tricky to identify, especially if you don’t have much comparative material available.

The first challenge was to work out which bits of bone are present – something that Rhea and Jake managed very well. This particular specimen is composed of a broken portion of right mandible (showing the coronoid process, condyloid process and angular process), the left ilium, and the first three cervical vertebrae (which include the axis and atlas bones).

Identifying the species was a bit more tricky using just these few bits of bone, but several of you managed to get there. Henstridgesj was the first to suggest Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #132 answer

On Friday I gave you these objects to identify:

I expected you to work out what these came from pretty easily – and you proved me right. In fact, I think this was probably the easiest mystery object so far, given that everyone managed to get a correct identification of Continue reading →