Paleontologists have been excavating the Pipestone Creek bonebed since the 1970s
A photo of the dinosaur bonebed site near Pipestone Creek, west of Grande Prairie Alta., taken on June 22. (Submitted by Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum)
Paleontologists have excavated more bones from a site near Grande Prairie, Alta., that will help provide a glimpse into how dinosaurs behaved when they roamed the earth.
In mid-June, researchers discovered the juvenile hip bone of a Pachyrhinosaurus, along with some vertebrae, ribs and foot bones, in the Pipestone Creek bonebed south of Wembley.
At the time of that discovery, the researchers — from the Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum in Wembley, Alta., 24 kilometres west of Grande Prairie — had been working to excavate a Pachyrhinosaurus femur, two lower leg bones and a partial juvenile skull that had been uncovered late in the 2021 excavation season.
The fossils provide a snapshot into the lives of Pachyrhinosaurus, a horned four-legged dinosaur that resembled a rhinoceros. Instead of a horn like Triceratops, a distant relative, it had a big bony bump on its nose.
Dozens of dinosaur bones have been unearthed in an area west of Grande Prairie. Paleontologists with the Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum in northern Alberta recently made the discovery. Emily Bamforth is the museum curator and was part of the team.
The researchers also found other fossils last month, including a tyrannosaur tooth, a small theropod tooth and a tooth from a rare mammal.
The Pipestone Creek bonebed is about 35 kilometres southwest of Grande Prairie. Researchers believe the packed bones are a result of dinosaurs dying in a flood that washed them all into that area.
The bonebed was discovered in the 1970s by a local high school teacher. For decades since the discovery, paleontologists have been digging through the densely packed bones. Bamforth said the major push for finding specimens has come in the last decade.
The bonebed inspired the creation of the museum in Wembley, named after paleontologist Philip J. Currie. The museum opened in 2015.
And although it is tedious work, the fact that they still have so many bones to sift through is an exciting prospect for paleontologists.
“We always joke that it’s kind of job security,” Bamforth said.
She said they know the bonebed goes back several hundred metres into the hill so “this could literally be worked for another several decades for sure.”