Fossil of bone-crushing mammal a first in the Northwest
Related: First mesonychid from Oregon (Palaeontologia Electronica)
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Source: Associated Press
Fossil of bone-crushing mammal a first in the Northwest
Updated Jul 13, 10:25 AM; Posted Jul 13, 10:07 AM
By The Associated Press
BEND — Scientists say a fossil jaw bone misidentified for 50 years turns out to belong to a bone-crushing mammal and is the first to be found in the Northwest.
Scientists tell the Bend Bulletin in a story Friday that the 40-million-year-old fossil discovered at the John Day Fossil Beds in eastern Oregon is from a Harpagolestes.
That's a hoofed mammal that's a cross between a pig and a hyena.
John Day Fossil Beds National Monument Chief Paleontologist Nicholas Famoso says scientists previously thought the fossil was from a polar bear-like creature.
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Read more: https://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/2019/07/fossil-of-bone-crushing-mammal-a-first-in-the-us-northwest.html
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The John Day mesonychid was initially mis-identified as Hemipsaladon grandis, another large predator that would have shared a range with the mesonychid.
NPS
Source: Oregon Public Broadcasting
Ancient 'Hyena-Pig' Discovered To Have Once Roamed Oregon
by Erin Ross Follow OPB July 11, 2019 5 p.m. | Updated: July 12, 2019 12:25 p.m. | Portland, Ore.
Oregon’s weirdest predator, the first of its kind in the state, was found in a museum drawer. A piece of it, anyway.
Hyena-pig. Murder-cow. With no modern analog, scientists have resorted to combinations of common animals to describe it. Dug up decades ago in the Hancock Mammal Quarry near John Day, Oregon, the bone from this prehistoric creature languished, misidentified in museum storage, until Selina Robson pulled it from its drawer.
Robson wasn’t looking for a murder-cow when she found the specimen. It was a fossilized jaw, slightly smooshed, and it was huge: about the length of her forearm. It was labeled “Hemipsaladon,” a type of creodont, which were large, bear-like predators that roamed Oregon 40 million years ago.
But Robson, at the time an undergrad student at the University of Oregon, had spent a lot of time looking at Hemipsaladon specimens, trying to identify one for a class assignment.
“I looked at it and said, ‘This doesn’t look right. This doesn’t look right at all,’” Robson said. She set it near her spot in the lab, mentally labeling it as “Weird Thing Found In A Closet” and left it there for a few months.
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Read more: https://www.opb.org/news/article/carnivorous-ungulate-oregon-mesonychid-hyena-pig/