Dinosaur bones found in valley

Wednesday, April 12, 2000 | 10:28 a.m.

The site, reported to the Bureau of Land Management by two teen-agers who found the bones while they were motorcycling, is being policed by the federal agency to keep vandals away.

"The site has been - and is being - vandalized since we visited there," said Gary Bowyer, historical archaeologist with the BLM. "Some of the pieces have been removed."

Bowyer said a field paleontologist told the agency that the bones are those of a mastodon from the early Pliocene epoch which dates back 10 million years. The specimen the boys found is probably 3 million years old, Bowyer said.

The paleontologist is part of a group of specialists representing University of Nevada, Reno, University of Arizona and the Los Angeles Museum of Natural History who have been studying the Pine Nut Mountains for several years.

The site was reported to the BLM by Derek Prosser and Dustin Turner. The two were motorcycling on March 23 and noticed the bones. Trash and piles of crushed bones indicated that others had found the site as well.

"It's a double-edged sword," Bowyer said. "We want to open it to the public, but we can't leave it open if the public is going to vandalize it."

According to BLM regulations, vertebrate fossils - such as those of the mastodon - may only be collected with a permit because of their relative rarity and scientific importance. All vertebrate fossils collected under a permit must be held in an approved repository. Violators face criminal prosecution.

Bowyer said the agency would seek funding to excavate the site because it is too remote to leave intact.

Prosser collected samples from the site which he turned over to the BLM once it had been established that the fossilized bones were on agency property.

"We are still giving kudos to Derek," said Bowyer. "He did the right thing by reporting it."

Dr. Gary Haynes, chairman of the anthropology department at University of Nevada, Reno, concurred.

"Any kind of fossil find is rare," Haynes said. "It's great that he (Derek) told somebody. The attitude on public land is that it really does belong to the rest of the state."

Haynes said mastodons survived in many parts of North America, but specimens from 3 million years ago are few and far between.

Along with mastodons, the Pine Nut Mountains served as the stomping grounds for giant camels, gophers, squirrels, llamas, deer, two kinds of horses, an extinct bear, sloths, rabbits and pigs.

The mastodons ranged in size from eight to 10 feet at the shoulder and weighed up to six tons. The specimen the boys found in late March probably was carried downstream. It's unlikely the entire skeleton is at the site, experts say. For that to have occurred, the animal would have had to be buried alive.

Compared to modern elephants, mastodons were squat and long in the body. Hair was coarse and reddish brown. Their teeth had blunt cones used to graze on herbs, shrubs and trees.

The area at the time was wetter and warmer, with lakes and small streams. Features and events from the Pliocene epoch include mountain uplift and cool climate. It's part of the Tertiary period when mammals increased in size and numbers. The Pliocene epoch was followed by the Ice Age.