MOH and I found these scattered bones on the flood plain of Slough Creek near Highway 50 at Devils Gate when coming back from our breccia hike. We thought it might be a sheep (or more than one sheep) because of the bits of wool (or light colored fur?) that were scattered all around.I'm not terribly good at identifying bones, but found these comparison skulls: cow, sheep, mule deer, and another mule deer, enlarged from this page. Still can't tell! Any ideas?
6 comments:
It's cool to find bones and feathers and rocks and things.
I think it is a cow skull. The shape of the bone under the eye socket is distinctive.
I thought the lower jaw looked too flat to be a cow, but maybe the shape of that depends on the type of cow or the age.
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The apparent scale tells me cow. Also the twisted bailing twine, as cows are not too particular as to what they eat, sheep not so much. There is a lot of the skull missing, probably bears, as coyotes don't usually crack the skull for the highly desirable oil rich brain.
Thanks for weighing in about the skull, Mike.
We don't have bears out in central Nevada anymore - mountain lions are the dominant or largest predator.
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