#bonegeeks

There are some great resources online for finding images of comparative material for skulls, but the postcranial skeleton tends to be quite badly represented online even for common species. I’d love to change that, but it’s a big challenge for one person.

Paramastoid process of Pig (Sus scrofa)

That’s why I’d like to set up #bonegeeks on Twitter (and maybe on other social media as well). The way I see it, people who have access to skeletal material could easily take snaps of bits of postcrania from known species (preferably with something for scale) using their phone and share the image to Twitter, Tumblr or Facebook with the name of the species and the bone (and perhaps where the specimen is held).

With the #bonegeeks tag it should be easy to collate images and hopefully start building up a comparative collection of images to make identifications easier.

It could start with a bone of the week to get the seldom depicted bones better represented and I’m sure #bonegeeks would be willing to respond to requests if there were particular bones that someone wanted to see.

I wonder if this could work… shall we give it a go and find out? Please add your thoughts on this idea in the comments section below or on Twitter using the #bonegeeks hashtag.

Oh and here’s how the idea got started: [View the story “#bonegeeks” on Storify]

Friday mystery object #202 answer

Last Friday I gave you this big chunk of bone to identify:

I was hoping that it might be a little bit of a challenge because it doesn’t seem to have any really diagnostic characters, but your shape-matching skills were good and several of you managed to get a close identification.

Heather was straight in with the suggestion of it being the back part of the frontal bone (the bit that makes up the front and top of the skull) of an Aurochs – the very large, extinct ancestor of modern Cows. Wouter van Gestel also suggested one of the large bovids – the Asian Water Buffalo, and Ben Gruwier agreed with both Heather and Wouter in saying that it was from a large bovid.

This was as far as I had managed to get with the identification myself, however the specimen had a number (39.16), which I was able to check against the natural history registers. The first part of the number told me to check in the register for the year 1939 and it was the 16th entry for that year, so it was easy to find (unlike with some numbering systems with museum specimens).

It turns out that this specimen is in fact the frontal bone of a Gaur or Indian Bison Bos gaurus Smith,1827, and it turns out that the Gaur has a distinctive ridge between the horns, which is what this specimen is showing, so I should have been able to work it out from the morphology (I will be able to in future).

Bull Gaur can weigh up to 1.5 tonnes and stand 2.2m (7’2″) to the shoulder – they’re enormous. Their only natural predators are the Tigers and large Crocodiles they share their Southeast Asian forest habitat with, but even then Gaur have been known to kill Tigers by trampling and goring them.

Perhaps unsurprisingly these animals are far more risk from humans and have been hunted for meat and trophies until they have become threatened. They are protected by CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species), but illegal trade continues and their forest habitats are constantly being lost due to human encroachment.

It’s disheartening that so many of my mystery objects end with a comment about human activities driving a species towards extinction, but unfortunately it’s a massive problem in the world we live in. I wonder if there will be any wild Gaur left in 2039, just 100 years after this specimen was collected?

Friday mystery object #197 answer

On Friday I gave you this skull to identify:

As I suspected, it wasn’t too much of a challenge. Jake got in quick with the suggestion of a Sri Lankan Python, with Gina Allnatt, Kevin and Rhina Duque-Thues all agreeing with a generic Python sp. identification. Nicola Newton also suggested Python, but she was of the opinion that it was probably a Royal Python or Carpet Python on the basis of the size.

I agree with Nicola and think that this is most likely the skull of a Royal (or Ball) Python Python regius (Shaw, 1802), based on the size of the specimen and the shape of the supratemporal and frontal bones compared to other Pythons I was able to find images for (if you don’t know which bones I mean you can see what I mean on a handy annotated picture of a Python skull from the Digimorph website).

The skull is one of several similar specimens from the old King’s College teaching collection, so it’s a pretty good bet that the skulls came from either research animals or pets. The Royal Python is a fairly small African Python that is commonly sold as a pet because it has a mild temperament – so that helps offer a bit of support for the identification, although what’s really needed is a detailed identification key for Python skulls or access to good comparative material.

The lack of good resources for identifying the skulls of snakes is a bit frustrating. After working with bird and mammal skulls, where there are some amazing resources like Skullsite and the Mammalian Crania Photographic Archive I’m still searching for something similar for reptiles. Perhaps the Deep Scaly Project will deliver the goods one day… here’s hoping!

Friday mystery object #197

This week I have a skull for you to identify – to make a change from the more tricky specimens I’ve had recently. Any idea what this belonged to?

As usual you can leave your comments, questions and suggestions below and I’ll do my best to respond. Enjoy!

Friday mystery object #194 answer

On Friday I gave you this rather unusual looking skull to identify:

In fact, it’s so unusual that it doesn’t even look entirely like a skull, so it’s not surprising that the specimen proved a bit of a challenge.

Some elements (like the lower jaw) look a bit like they’re from a turtle, but other elements of the skull shape look more like they belong to an amphibian – from something like Necturus perhaps. Despite these similarities to some of the ‘basal’ tetrapods, the skull is actually from a fish.

The reason why it looks quite similar to a tetrapod skull and less like the average fish is because it belongs to a member of the Lobe-finned fish (Sarcopterygii) which are more closely related to the tetrapods than the more common and diverse Ray-finned fish (Actinopterygii). Despite the difficult identification, microecos managed to spot that this was a Lungfish and henstridgesj managed to identify the species as being the Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #194

This week I have a specimen that’s on display at the Horniman Museum for you to try your hand at identifying:

As usual you can leave your suggestions, observations and suggestions in the comments section below. Enjoy the challenge!

Friday mystery object #192 answer

On Friday I gave you this unidentified specimen from the Horniman’s collections to take a look at. I had already had a go at working out what it is, but it never hurts to get a second opinion.

It’s actually a bit of a generic looking overall shape, perhaps reminiscent of a owl or a maybe a pheasant of some sort. However, the nares (nostrils) are very small and round and set in a bill that is sharp, shortish and very solidly constructed, which is something you only really see in a few passerines, some parrots and the falcons. The skull is too big for a passerine and the bill is totally the wrong overall shape for a parrot, which leaves us with a falcon – a fairly small one at that.

From there the shape of the palate and the proportions of the cranium led me to a species identification that I’m pleased to say agreed with that proposed by Tony Irwin and Wouter van Gestel (who eloquently explained the indicative characters that I mentioned above). We all think that this is the cranium of a Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #192

This week I have a skull with no data that I came across in the collections a little while back. I think I managed to get a decent identification on it, but I’d be interested to see if you all agree:

What do you think it is? As usual you can put your suggestions below. Thanks for helping out!

Friday mystery object #191 answer

On Friday we had this skull submitted by Dr Ben Swift for identification:

mystery191c

Now this is quite obviously a primate, as it has a bony ring around the orbit, a bony back wall to the orbit and just eight incisors as opposed to the twelve that forms the basal condition for mammals. The teeth also tell us that this is an Old World Monkey (Cercopithecidae), since these primates only have eight premolars instead of the twelve you find in the New World Monkeys (Platyrrhini). The small canines suggest that this is the skull of a female.

From there it starts getting a bit more difficult. The fairly small size of the specimen ruled out a few genera, but the main features that helped narrow down the possibilities were the very flat face, the heavy bony rings around the orbits, the flaring of the zygomatic arches (cheekbones) and the short and rounded braincase. Effectively the only way to consider these features is to look at a lot of comparative specimens (the excellent Mammalian Crania Photographic Archive proved very useful for this).

After a lot of consideration I found myself in agreement with the suggestion of something from the genus Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #191

This week I have a skull for you to have a go at identifying that has been submitted by Dr Ben Swift. Any idea what species this belongs to?

I’ll be trying to get an identification on this specimen myself and I’m not the best at primates, so your suggestions and comments would be appreciated – let’s see if we can crowdsource an identification!

Friday mystery object #190 answer

On Friday I gave you this skull to identify:

The animal it comes from is quite distinctive, with loads of character, so it’s no big surprise that so many of you managed to identify it.

So well done to Jake, Dave Godfrey, henstridgesj, Mieke Roth, Wouter van Gestel, Steven D. Garber and Crispin – this is indeed a Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #190

This week I have a skull with character for you to identify. It will probably prove to be little challenge to some of you, but if you know what it is please try to use cryptic clues so you don’t spoil the game for others:

Put your thoughts below and I’ll be sure to make comments during the day. Enjoy!

Friday mystery object #189 answer

On Friday I gave you this skull to have a go at identifying:

I didn’t do a very good job of responding to comments I’m afraid, as I was rather busy at day two of this year’s Natural Sciences Collections Association conference at the Yorkshire Museum. Nonetheless, you managed to work out what this specimen came from without any input from me.

Jake spotted that it was the skull of a big reptile, more importantly, a big reptile with heterodont dentition (meaning it’s teeth aren’t all the same shape). That narrowed down the possibilities considerably. From there henstridgesj, Wouter van Gestel and Barbara Powell came to the conclusion that this is the skull of a Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #189

This week I have another interesting skull that came up during one of our recent reviews:

Any idea what animal this belonged to? You can put your suggestions below and I’ll do my best to reply, although I will be at the NatSCA conference today, so it will depend on the quality of internet access on my phone.

Friday mystery object #188 answer

On Friday I gave you this previously misidentified specimen to have a go at identifying:

It turns out that you did a great job!

Jake and Mieke Roth immediately spotted that the skull belonged to a large turtle of some kind, henstridgesj narrowed it down to a fresh-water turtle and he and Steven D. Garber recognised that despite the large size, it wasn’t from one of the snapping turtles (which is what the original identification mistakenly had it as) and that it was more likely to be from one of the side-necked turtles. However, microecos went one better and managed to get a species identification for the specimen that agreed with the identification that our visiting reptile expert Dr Colin McCarthy who suggested Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #188

This week I have an object that came up in one of the Bioblitz collections reviews at the Horniman recently. It’s a great specimen, but it was misidentified by the preparators when it was purchased back in 1937 and that identification had never been corrected. Any idea what it should have been labelled as?

You can put your suggestions, questions and observations below and I’ll do my best to reply. On Monday I’ll post the identification that our incredibly helpful specialist reviewer suggested, so you can see how you did. Good luck!

Friday mystery object #187 answer

On Friday I gave you this somewhat odd object to identify:

My first thought when seeing it was Bowser from the Mario games:

This probably isn’t the worst place to start the identification, since the animal with this feature was clearly big, scaly and toothy. This was obviously in the minds of Barbara Powell and Wouter van Gestel, who reached the correct conclusion that this is the structure from the tip of the snout of an adult male Continue reading →

Friday mystery object #186 answer

On Friday I gave you a mystery skull from the forests of south Thailand to identify, courtesy of Mark Ribbands via William Vine:

When I first saw this skull I was immediately struck by its similarity to that of a Badger:

That badger-like quality (which Jake also noticed) got me thinking that it may belong to an Asian Hog Badger, but the skull length is 190mm, which is a bit too big even for a large adult Hog Badger and the unfused sutures, partially erupted canines and short muzzle make it pretty obvious that the skull comes from a very young animal (I talked about the characteristics of juvenile animals in a post a couple of years ago).

Jake recognised that the skull was from a juvenile, as did Wouter van Gestel, who went on to suggest a much larger carnivore, the Malayan Sun Bear. The other possibility would be the Asiatic Black Bear, but without comparable juvenile skulls of both it is hard to be sure which it is, but I’m pretty certain it is the skull of a bear and looking at the shape of the adult bear skulls I think the Sun Bear Helarctos malayanus Horsfield, 1825 is probably the most likely candidate.

Sun Bears are the smallest members of the bear family and are well adapted to climbing, which they do a lot of as they search for the insects, fruit and honey that make up most of their diet. Here’s a video of a Sun Bear cub putting those impressive climbing skills to the test:

Happy Year of the Snake!

Today marks the start of the Chinese Year of the Snake and tomorrow we start the Herpetology phase of our collections review at the Horniman. How very apt!

Here’s a specimen labelled ‘Boa Constrictor’ that came to light while we were preparing for the review that I thought you might like:

Have a very prosperous and healthy Year of the Snake!

Friday mystery object #186

This week I have an object for you that came through as an enquiry from Mark Ribbands via William Vine. It’s 190mm long and was found in the forest of South Thailand:

Any idea what it came from? As usual you can leave your suggestions below – I may not be able to respond during the day as I’m at a seminar on Natural Science Collections and the Law, but I’m sure that there will be some interesting discussion about this object from the regulars!