Lone Hunter Posted January 14, 2022 Share Posted January 14, 2022 First bone is modern from Trinity river so this for the sake of learning, assuming it is a Tarsometatarsus, my question is how can you tell if bone is from waterfowl and how hard to determine bird species? The dark bone is from Cretaceous Woodbine and I'm not familiar with preservation on them, this one is funky, scratch it with fingernail and it's powdery, might be modern and hoping it's not too worn for ID. Thanks for help! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rockwood Posted January 14, 2022 Share Posted January 14, 2022 I think you are right about the first bone. It would probably take an expert to go further with the question. Maybe @Auspex is around. I think the second one might be a turtle humerus. The odds would seem to favor it being modern. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ClearLake Posted January 16, 2022 Share Posted January 16, 2022 I’m not an expert, but I do have a book. In looking through Avian Osteology by Gilbert, et al it would appear that your bird bone is something in the realm of a small swan. Unfortunately, the two ends of your bone are a bit beat up and that’s where many diagnostic characteristics are found. But the overall shape, size and configuration of the three trochlea (where the toes attach) looks right for something in the goose/swan range. There is a nice binary key in the book that will get you down to family level, but it takes knowing a lot of anatomical detail. I would agree with @Rockwood that the second bone looks like turtle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lone Hunter Posted January 16, 2022 Author Share Posted January 16, 2022 Thank you, I was thinking it was a good sized waterfowl, Canadian geese are in the area every winter and that may be the source. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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