ONLY ON ABC-7: Researchers working to piece together fossil found in Las Cruces last year

Researchers at New Mexico State University are working to piece together a fossil dating back millions of years.

Summer 2017, Jude Sparks was playing with his brother, Hunter, in the Las Cruces desert when he tumbled on a tusk.

It turned out to be part of a Stegomastadon fossil, an elephant-like animal that NMSU Professor Dr. Peter Houde said probably went extinct 1.2 million years.

“We’ve only been able to confirm about six skulls that have been found, this is one of them,” said Houde.

The fossil’s fragility has researchers taking extra preservation precautions. Geological Sciences Undergraduate Researcher Danielle Peltier said “the skull bone is about as thin as an eggshell.”

“When we find it we have to harden it with plastics that soak into the fossil bone,” said Houde. “It would not be able to support its own weight so we covered it with plaster and put boards on it to reinforce.”

But it wasn’t the first found in the Borderland, and it may not be the last. Houde said a major source of nourishment had the creatures migrating to the area in droves.

“The Rio Grande,” Houde explained, “attracted animals and the sediments buried things, large animals like this, very quickly.”

Houde took out a ruler to compare the Stegomastodon skull to one of a modern-day elephant.

The two animals are distant relatives, and share a similar skeletal structure

Years of being buried took a toll on the Stegomastodon’s remains, deforming the spinal cord.

“This is what, unfortunately, happens sometimes with fossilization, then crushing from the sediments,”said Houde.

It also changed the creature’s chemical composition.

“These things are all radioactive,” said Houde. “The kind of exposure you have is critical.”

If you find a fossil on your own, Houde said to contact him at the NMSU Biology Department, or via email at phoude@nmsu.edu.

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