A museum volunteer on a recreational hike stumbled upon what he thought was a simple pile of rocks, but turned out to be a far rarer find.
Jeff Dornbusch, a volunteer with the Truth or Consequences museum in southern New Mexico, saw a strange looking pile of rocks while on a hike nearly a decade ago — but he couldn't locate the exact spot he found them until recently. It turns out that those strange rocks remained intact and are actually the fossilized remains of a turtle that lived 90 million years ago, the Las Cruces Sun-News reports.
Thanks to Dornbusch, scientists and volunteers from the New Mexico Museum of Natural History excavated the turtle's remains last week.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The turtle is thought to have lived in a swampy environment tens of millions of years ago, during the late Cretaceous period. It will be taken to the New Mexico Museum of Natural History in Albuquerque for display.
Continue reading for free
We hope you're enjoying The Week's refreshingly open-minded journalism.
Subscribed to The Week? Register your account with the same email as your subscription.