Thursday

Tuosu lakers

As I unwrap our new specimens collected this field season and clean them for storage, some fascinating patterns began to emerge:

[washed fossils being dried]

It turns out that we collected specimens representing all three of Birger Bohlin's horned artiodactyls described from the Tuosu Lake area. Two of the species were named after the twin lakes Tuosu and Keluke, and the third after the Olongbuluk Mountain.

[The Tuosu Lake beast, Tosunnoria]

The black and white photo in each set was taken from Bohlin's (1937) original description of these critters.

[The Kelike Lake beast, Qurliqnoria]

[The Olongbuluk Mountain beast, Olongbulukia]

Approximately 33% of the specimens have been unwrapped and boxed; this work will continue to reveal the true extent of our discoveries this year.


6 comments:

Unknown said...

Wow! I can't wait to hear more about this; will it be published/written up you think?

Spencer

Zhijie (Jack) said...

Hi Spencer. Sorry I haven't been answering your comments until now. Yes these specimens will be described and published, that is part of my goal here in Beijing...Xiaoming and I will be working on the horned ungulates first because they are the most abundant in the Chuanshuiliang Fauna. I'll post more photos as I sort through the fossils! ~Jack

Unknown said...

Sorry I haven't been answering your comments until now.

Don't apologize! You were in the field; if pickings had been slim enough for you to need to occupy your time with answering blog comments, things would have been pretty sad indeed, no?

Let me know when the papers are published and all please? I'll have to track down copies of them!

Thanks!

Spencer

Ryan said...

So when you did these comparison photos with the black background (very cool) did you use photoshop or just cut out the black and whites by hand?
-Ryan

Anonymous said...

Hey Jack!
I was just browsing through your pictures and they look amazing! Of course you're going to have to tell me more when you get back. Just started classes last week and it's super busy. I'm taking this crazy neuroanatomy class that's pretty cool- my professor is 85 and just great. Hope all is well- call me or email me when you get a chance!

Love sis

Zhijie (Jack) said...

Ryan: I used photoshop to cut and paste a scanned image of the original publication onto the color photo of the specimens which I took with a black background.