Baby plesiosaur found with giant fossil oysters near South Australia’s Neales River. The fossil, discovered accidentally while S.A. Museum Director Tim Flannery was eating his lunch, even had polished stomach stones in its gut region. The one metre (3ft 3ins) long baby plesiosaur is in a lime rich rock and will be soaked in acid for 6 months to free up the bones.
Editorial Comment: This fossil and its surrounding rock, (which we have been to see) can teach us several things:
Oysters are now small and plesiosaurs are extinct. This evidence points to decline and degeneration, not evolution to more complexity and biodiversity.
The fossil has a well preserved gut region. This is evidence of rapid burial.
Its stomach stones are a clue to its diet originally being vegetarian. (Ref. plesiosaur, oysters, diet)