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MODERN
"FOSSILS"?
There has been a disturbing
occurrence in the fossil business with some fraudulent suppliers offering
MODERN
skulls
of various living mammals such as bear, bobcat, coyote, beaver, raccoon,
mink, muskrat and wolf, etc.. as being FOSSILS. These specimens are
often passed off as "Bonner Springs" fossils. These are usually made
to look old as if they were found in river banks or springs and appear to look prehistoric. They
are sold both loose and in artificially created matrix reconstructed to
appear as though the skull is still partially embedded. The skulls are
modern specimens available from various sources such as trappers and
breeding farms. Often, the skulls are from trappers or commercial
furrier animal farms. In some cases, you can even see the knife cuts
in the bone surface as the skinner cut off the hide from the skull.
One website that sells these "fossils" has a mink skull with perfect
demonstration of these modern skinning knife cuts all over the surface. You can research
this with Google to see their prevalence and price of modern skulls of these
animals and how easy it is to acquire them in numbers.
Here is one source. You can buy a
skull here, dye it and place it in a mixture of sand with glue and water.
Voila! You are in business! The skulls are
treated with dye to darken and give them the appearance of age. One
bit of proof in their modern provenance is that if
they truly were found in an ancient or prehistoric deposit, the TEETH would
be darker than the white tone of modern skulls. These creations are
being sold for many, many times what they can be obtained for as the modern
specimens that they are. Read on....
Dealers will
casually put in the time period PLEISTOCENE - HOLOCENE to keep them
legally off the hook but often the sales descriptions or comments by the
seller will refer to these modern skulls as "fossils" or "Pleistocene fossils" when
all indications of their characteristics prove otherwise. For the
prices they are selling for quite frankly, you could buy an old skull from
an animal trapper for considerably less. Both will be "Holocene"!
These
works of art look impressive but it's simply important to know that THEY ARE NOT FOSSILS,
that is, they do NOT come from prehistory dating back to a period exceeding
10,000 years ago, or, a PAST geologic age. They are modern skulls,
artificially altered and place in artificial matrix. Furthermore,
these pieces are either forbidden to export or requrie a CITES permit.
If they are shipped outside of the USA and fish and wildlike is alerted by
US Customs, the piece will be and should be confiscated!
WHAT IS A FOSSIL?
Merriam Webster's Dictionary
defines
FOSSIL as "preserved from a past geologic
age". Referring to the geologic time scale, we are currently in the HOLOCENE
PERIOD. The term FOSSIL or PREHISTORIC pertains to remains from a
period EARLIER
than the Holocene. The last period considered PREHISTORY or
fossil-bearing, is the PLEISTOCENE PERIOD. This ended 10,000 years ago
and is the cut-off point for what is and what isn't a true fossil. Any
remains of plants or animals AFTER 10,000 years that are found in the
Holocene are NOT
true fossils and should not be presented as such.
HOW CAN YOU TELL?
If anyone reading this has
any reason to doubt what is said in the following text, email this article
to a professional paleontologist and ask them yourself the validity to these
claims.
1. Irregular staining
of dye concentrated on bone regions of greater porosity. Spring
deposits produce bone and teeth of evenly distributed light colors.
2. Teeth have modern
coloration with no pigment or patina IN the enamel, only ON the enamel.
3. Lower jaws are
perfectly matched and original to the skulls indicating these are modern.
Fossil skulls are NOT found in river terrace gravel deposits associated with
the lower jaws!
4. Perfect preservation
and intact nature of the most delicate features such as sinus membranes and
thin zygomatic arches. Never are gravel deposit specimens found with
zero damage like these. River Terrace gravel deposits are usually
large, heavy rock gravel that would damage or crush delicate skulls of mink,
raccoon, bobcat, etc..
The evidence is the nature of
the color of the dye in the bone and how it took to the bone.
Additional evidence is the fact that the teeth did not take to the dye.
Bone is porous and can take to dying with a dark pigment, quite well.
These faked modern skulls will have more intense areas of the dye on the
edges of bone processes and in sutures, in some cases. Anywhere the
bone is more porous, the dye will staing that region darker. True fossil skulls are usually evenly colored by thousands of years of
exposure. Modern dyed skulls will not take the pigment evenly.
Tooth enamel, however, is
very dense and will not easily take the stain of modern dying so these
modern dyed skulls will have white or off-white teeth with evidence of dye
on the surface, not IN the enamel like a specimen will have of true age. Note,
modern living beaver have orange incisors when they are alive
so the color of these teeth will always look prehistoric, regardless of age.
Over 10,000 year true fossils of white teeth in dark bone also exist in
nature but the teeth will always have some mottling, veining or unnatural
color highlights (blue, orange, red, yellow, etc..) compared to dingy,
present-day animal teeth.
Modern teeth from animals can
look discolored but the discoloration will look more like plain old "dirty"
teeth rather than the beautiful colors some true fossil teeth come in when
white is the dominant color.
Some of these fake creations have the dye filled in the cracks of the teeth
or washed over the enamel but it is not IN the enamel.
River terrace deposits can be
rich in fossil bones but these bones are jumbled, scattered, often buried
and moved about. Specimens are mixed and shuffled, never in
association of the same animal yet, in every case of these fake fossil
skulls, the jaws match perfectly to the skulls and are obviously the
original jaw to the skull. Finding a skull with the original jaw in
association is not reality.
Another aspect that gives these fakes away is their intact nature.
Since we know the type of deposit these so-called
"fossils" are coming from, we can apply some common sense deductions to
determine that some features just don't make sense if they were over
10,000 years or 8,000 years as some claim. Some obvious characteristics that these skulls
cannot
be old are their mere completeness and degree of
intactness which is too good to be true for such age IN THIS KIND OF DEPOSIT,
in the numbers of specimens that are found. Gravel bed, river terrace
deposits dating to the last Ice Age have been subjected to extreme pressure,
movement and disturbances that have no equal after the glaciers receded.
While many nice fossils can be found in such deposits that date back to
prehistoric periods, the
energy exerted on the strata often would damage or destroy the delicate
intact skulls of small mammals. Delicate anatomical features would be
eroded, broken or otherwise damaged for a true Pleistocene gravel bed or
river deposit. The skulls being sold in question, do not show this
characteristic damage.
BUT IT'S PARTLY MINERALIZED OR DARK
IN COLOR
The fact that a bone becomes
mineralized or stained dark is very deceiving when figuring age. In
peat bogs or river and spring deposits, a modern day animal can fall into
the water and, depending on the chemistry of the sediment and water, its
skeleton become mineralized in a matter of just a few hundred years.
Dark river waters that are rich in tannins (tea-colored water caused by
decaying vegetation) can stain modern bone IN A YEAR to a color that resembles a
fossil bone from 5 million years ago! However, the teeth will remain
white with the deposits ON the enamel, not color IN the enamel.
Of course, if you want to be
absolutely sure of the age of a mammal skull that looks too good to be a
true fossil, C-14 dating is the least expensive way to determine its age.
Consult your local museum or university as they will often perform this test
for a fee.
FINALLY, THE OBVIOUS
Sometimes, the obvious is
overlooked. Ask yourself some questions.
These modern fabrications sell
for a mere fraction of what a true intact and complete fossil skull would
sell for. In the grand scheme of things, can one really expect to
purchase a perfect fossil bobcat skull for a few hundred dollars?
Doesn't the sudden presence of a bunch of these pieces on the market seem
odd? How can such fragile bone structures like zygomatic arches be
perfectly intact on something thousands of years old found in a gravel
deposit?
Deal with highly knowledgeable
fossil suppliers who run their operation with professionalism and integrity.
If a dealer, website, or shop seems to lack an appearance of experience,
knowledge, professionalism and success, then walk on. Chances are they
have a number of "bad" pieces mixed in their inventory and even if they are
honest, probably do not know themselves, what they are really selling.
Most important - get written UNCONDITIONAL guarantees of
authenticity, age andidentification from the dealer on EVERY purchase.
Do your homework and know your collecting.
Knowledge is power.
In every marketplace where
authenticity is important, there too, fraud will exist.
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