Huge fossil skull! 4 million year old fossil revealed [My rarest fossil yet - New Zealand] 

The truth of the matter is, that fossil is around 4,400 years old, fossilized in Noah's worldwide flood. Instead of using water, next time God will use fire to cleanse the earth. And sin shall be no more.

4 million huh. Whatever you say bud.

Do you ever sell fossils?

What is the name of the first musical track? I have heard it in a lot of videos recently. Reminds me of Happy Gilmore so I really like it.

Don't be a party pooper he has changed his mind before.​@@earlysda

Thanks so much Artur!

Oooh that would be awesome!! It's not impossible at all!

Thanks so much Linus! It's quite a bit of work bit I enjoy the end video 😃

Hahhaaha it couldn't hide forever!

My pleasure!! This one was quite a quick prep with the air scribe, the acid did most of the work!

Thanks for watching! You have to go slow with these fossils, this is a new species so deserves all the care I can give!

I know right? I grew up by Puget Sound, and likely saw rocks like this quite often, without a clue as to what they were!

That is so awesome!! I'll need to get in touch with some turtle experts about this skull at some point

Must have been arguing dudes in wigs going in the woman's bathroom

Thanks so much Gary! I'm hoping to visit Aus soon to have a look around your country.

Thanks so much Steve!! Need to find that plesiosaur skull!

@@MamlamboFossils Will this piece be staying at home in your personal collection or is there a possibility you will be loaning/donating it to a museum of natural history there in New Zealand?

Nice! I'm the same - always looking for cool rocks 😁

Palm size skull fossils?

Thanks Kris! Yeah, so stoked about the entire specimen!

I have quite a bit going on!

Hahhaha got to get that music going for the prep 😄

Thanks so much Lisa! I've been really lucky with finding some amazing fossils

That was so awesome! Thanks for sharing it.

Thanks!

I can't wait to see what species this is!

Who knows what the next one will be!

It is such a crazy beast!! I'm going to prep the bottom so I can see the bones of the palate better, it might tell us if it's closer to a Kemps turtle or a loggerhead

It must have been a monster!

Thanks so much!

Not the sledgehammer!!

Thank you very much!

That is so weird! Good find though!

It must be out there somewhere 😄

Thanks so much Robin!

Thanks Francisca!

That was really nice separation!

Hopefully that will show up in the CT scan!

Also keeping my collection nice and small otherwise it's too much clutter!

Thanks Glenn!

My pleasure!

My pleasure Karen!

Thanks so much!!

Thanks so much!

Hahhahaha that's awesome!! Glad you enjoyed it

I was really fortunate to spot it!

Thanks so much!!

Those snapping turtles look prehistoric and I've seen some huge ones!

Yay!! I'm glad you enjoyed it. I've looked in one cave but only found shells

Thanks!

My pleasure Mick!

Thanks Richard! I have no idea how big the animal would have been, hopefully when it gets studied further someone will be able to tell us!

@@MamlamboFossils Thank you, I know it must be exciting for you, especially finding something like that or the Penguin, but we "The people watching" get so used to everything being speeded up into a half hour or 20 minute segment, we tend to forget it takes months. Hope your having g a great Hollinday weekend. Regards Richard

Thanks so much!

I have no idea why it's so gnarly in appearance! Very strange indeed, thanks for your kind words 😀

@@MamlamboFossils I am certainly no paleo-turtle physiologist... but I do play one on weekends and national holidays. So, having looked up a wholly insufficient number of papers/studies/reports, I am going to be so brave as to put forward a marginally tongue-in-cheek Differential Diagnosis for this turtle skull's gnarly condition: a) Developmental/Genetic - putting aside mutations which are not consistent with an individual's survival (e.g. a severe ectodermal dysplasia precludes the formation of supportive cortical bone... hard to paddle with overly flexible flipper bone), I suppose this could be a child-of-a-lesser-dysplasia. Cortication remains on the superior-most parietal and frontal bone. b) Developmental/Species-specific - perhaps we are looking at a turtle of the Leatherback line? (Dermochelys coriacea) They make use of chondro-osseous bone formation (in the shell, iirc?). Perhaps this was a young individual, and was in the still in the process of bone growth and formation. (Nah. The suture lines of the upper skull look robustly closed) carapace Perhaps this individual had spent time in a low-calcium-diet area, or they were in an area where the ocean pH was off (active volcanic zone) and calcium was being lost due to stoichiometric pressures? Not "acid burning thru the external soft tissues and directly leaching calcium from the skull... more like, the reaction of parathyroids to free calcium due to an external sink or perhaps during a major stage of shell formation??? REALLY grabbing at straws here. d) Pathologic - ah, here we go... In human anatomy, this is my comfort zone... In reptilian A&P, I am worse than Innocently Ignorant. But, hey, one can think of a number of pathologies... a bone cancer, robbing calcium from a dense supply; a parathyroid malady; dietary pathology that prevents proper calcium uptake; a resident or circulating enzyme underproduction that slows the formation of cortical bone... or any of a hundred signaling bio-chemicals that are responsible for normal bone ossification. This is a line of conjecture that has many, many starting points. Lastly, about the 'puncture' on the turtle's left parietal/postorbital/squamosal bones (I'm following suture lines... not a strict 'geographic' technique). Is it at all possible this is an incomplete fontanel closure? The reason I ask is there is a hint of 'bone granulation' going on there, with a bit of ingrowth on each of the three sides of the void. Perhaps it was a bite mark which the turtle initially survived, but succumbed to prior to wound closure? The tooth/claw seems to have very smooth sides, which (I would think) would leave a smooth-sided wound in the bone. Perhaps the turtle survived the initial attack and carried around the tooth, imbedded, as a trophy of the encounter. Gnarly indeed. This is so fun. Thanks for allowing me to ramble on a bit.

Thank you! Cheers!

The video almost takes more effort to put together 😂

@@MamlamboFossils Good point. We often forget about that aspect of RU-vid. Doing the initial video plus all the editing, etc. that it takes to educate and entertain the viewers. Thanks for ALL your efforts!

Thanks so much Carrie!! Yeah, that bone structure is so well preserved

It's one of my favorites!

Most of them are in storage waiting to be studied 😂

It does look right at you! The eyes follow you like the Mona Lisa 😂

Dankie man!

My pleasure!

That carapace must have been car bonnet sized!

The best kind as well!

It's very satisfying seeing it emerge like this!

Thanks so much! It was a really fun prep!

Thanks bro! It was a really fun fossil!

Yay please do and tell her I say hi!

It sure does take some time!

I think some of the Cretaceous ones were even bigger!

It could well be!! Going to have to wait for the experts to weigh in 😀

Thanks so much 😄

Ah thanks Alan, that's very kind of you. I learn something new everything when I do these preps and videos 😄