Argentina

November 6-29, 2009

November 23: Lago los Barreales and Proyecto Dino: Project Dino - Lab

Once we had finished the exterior portion of the tour, our guide took us inside the lab/workshop/museum. Once excavated, the bones and fossils are further cleaned, processed, tagged, stored and displayed here. The structure is pretty rudimentary (as the broken windows from the storm the night before bore witness to). We were a little surprised to see all these significant findings in these rudimentary quarters... one would think they'd be under some sort of museum care. But the project does not have any government funding and the only money they have is from the university and what they bring in on money from the guided tours.

Our guide was very knowledgeable and we wish we could have had some way to capture all the information he was throwing at us... it was pretty overwhelming!

A bit of history about the site:

The discovery of this paleontological site was on 12 February 2000, when a paleontological research team from the National University of Comahue, under the direction of paleontologist Jorge Calvo, rescued fossil remains in the water intake of the Mapuche communities Paynemil and Caxipayiñ. They then decided to explore the area in search of more fossils, on the north shore of Lago Los Barreales which was the start of the present excavation.
Within 5 years of sustained work at the site, approximately 1100 pieces of vertebrate fossils, about 300 pieces of plant debris and the remains of freshwater bivalve mollusks have been unearthed.

Three different types of dinosaurs have been discovered on the north shore of Lake Barreales, representing the major groups registered in South America. The first (and most abundant) to be discovered in this area are the sauropod dinosaurs. Carnivorous theropod dinosaurs as well as various ornithopods were the other types.

Futalognkosaurus dukei
Several sauropods have been found on the site, one of them corresponds to a new species of the group of titanosaurs, which is called Futalognkosaurus dukei. This dinosaur would have been 36 meters in length and weighed 80 tons. It is noteworthy that, so far, the project has excavated 70% of a skeleton, making it the most complete giant dinosaur in the world. Associated with it, they also found evidence of two other giant sauropods but smaller than Futalognkosaurus.

Our guide shows us some of the finds that are being cleaned up in the lab on site.

While most of the rough excavation is done outside, more of the detailed work is done here.

There are shelves and shelves of finds.

All the pieces are tagged. Often many pieces found in different spots have to be put together like a puzzle.

Several large finds.

In the museum part there was a display to show some of the bones found in a nearby vineyard. Hence the wine bottle in the display... it's not just a leftover artifact from the last paleontology party they had here! ;-)

Lots of original fossils. We were surprised that so many are kept on site...
we figured they'd be hauled off to a museum right away.

Dinosaur eggs on display. The round eggs are those of herbivores, while the carnivores lay oval-shaped eggs.

Our guide took one out for Rubby to hold and show to Sam. Let's go bowling!

Look, I'm holding and actual dinosaur bone!

Our guide was super nice and let us hold quite a few of the fossils and bones.
In this picture he is holding the claw of a carnivore.

The skull of giganotosaurus carolinii, the biggest carnivore dinosaur in the world. The skull was 6.5 feet long and the length would reach more than 45 feet (14 m).
This find was made in Lago E R Mexia by El Chocon and LOs Candeleros in the Neuquen province.