Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
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coastalpaleo.bsky.social
Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
@coastalpaleo.bsky.social
4.6K followers 1.2K following 2.1K posts
Marine mammal paleontologist, artist, snorkeler, beachcomber, tidepool enthusiast. Blog: www.coastalpaleo.blogspot.com
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coastalpaleo.bsky.social
Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️ @coastalpaleo.bsky.social · Aug 27
New #watercolor - the skull that launched a thousand papers - Aetiocetus weltoni, the ~25 myo toothed baleen whale that likely had teeth and baleen - from the Oligocene of Oregon. I started this last winter and only finally finished it yesterday. 🐡 🦖🐬 #sciart #whaleontology #whalewednesday #art
A watercolor painting of a toothed baleen whale skull in side view. The jaws are closed, and the skull has a rather large eye socket; the nose is still quite far out on the snout. There are a series of mostly conical teeth that interlock like a crocodile.
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
smilodonichthys.bsky.social
Does this count as #FossilFriday ? Just to be safe, here's Bernie's skull
Side view of the skull held by my dad. His finger is sticking through the nose hole, the big hole behind it is where the eye went, big enough for a tennis ball. The skull shows the hooked nose of the thalattosaur and is about 18 inches long nose to back. Top view of the same skull. You can see that it split down the middle and most of the right half is missing. There is, however, a bit of the right top side my dad is holding up to the matching left side. In the very center of both parts of the skull is a large hole where the reptile's pineal gland aka "third eye" is. It likely would have been used to see light and movement. 3D print of the skull from the top with the missing left side reconstructed by mirroring the right side. While not corrected for distortion it still shows the basic shape and size of the skull, particularly how wide the skull needed to be to accommodate the animal's large eyes
November 21, 2025 at 9:15 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
daverodland.bsky.social
#FossilFriday isn't done yet! 🧪⚒️🦪 In today's installment, we have interior decor from a lovely little diner I had lunch in over 10 years ago, along the southern Oregon coast. Look, I have very specific professional interests. Some of them are boring.
Interior surface of a large oyster shell intensely bored by the demosponge Cliona, but half the shell is filled by the largest barnacle you've ever seen (okay, there's some larger Pliocene examples in California). The barnacle is less intensely perforated, but itself was colonized by large serpulid tube worms. Penny for scale (it's tiny by comparison)
November 21, 2025 at 10:23 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
cisneros.bsky.social
Este pequeno anfíbio viveu em Nazária, Piauí, +280 milhões de anos atrás. Timonya anneae era parecida a um axolote e tinha um modo de vida totalmente aquático. O que vemos aqui é um crânio que foi dividido ao meio no momento em que abrimos a rocha. #FossilFriday 1/2
Foto mostrando um fóssil de anfíbio, em cor branco-amarela, dentro de uma rocha cinza-marrom, partido ao meio, com uma régua em preto e branco para dar uma ideia do tamanho (crânio com aprox. 5cm).
November 21, 2025 at 7:58 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
women-archeopal.bsky.social
Today, for #FossilFriday, we present Madeleine Alberta Fritz (1896–1990): a Canadian pioneer of palaeontology, and affectionately known as “the great-grandmother of Palaeozoic Bryozoa.”
November 21, 2025 at 1:27 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
ferwen.bsky.social
#FossilFriday Forgotten women of paleontology: Estella Bergere Leopold wp.me/p3ihHu-5qE 🧪⚒️🌴 #womeninstem #histsci
November 21, 2025 at 7:59 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
mostlymammoths.bsky.social
An expansive view of how White Sands National Park may have appeared in the Pleistocene. Art by Karen Carr.

(from: www.karencarr.com/portfolio-im...)
Caption in website: "Shown: Aerial view of ancient Lake Otero, in what is now the central valley of New Mexico." Columbian mammoths and a baby C. mammoth are on the edge of a pond in the bottom right. The landscape is dotted by lots of ponds, green vegetation, white sand, megafauna and other animals. Enormous mountains and clouds are in the distance.
November 22, 2025 at 5:32 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
mostlymammoths.bsky.social
Look at all of those insect fossils! Wow!

Story by @donnadlu.bsky.social
Caption in article: "Dr Matthew McCurry with Jurassic fossil insect specimens held in the Australian Museum’s collection. Photograph: Louise Reily/Australian Museum" On either side of the paleontologist, there are shelves of fossils. A number of the shelves are open, displaying tons of fossils.
November 22, 2025 at 5:02 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
jvelezjuarbe.bsky.social
#FossilFriday visiting some old friends! This was the first turtle shell I collected, it is a pelomedusoid from the early #Oligocene Juana Diaz Fm. in southwestern #PuertoRico. Pelomedusoids are found in shallow marine deposits across the #GreaterAntilles until the Pliocene.
#CaribbeanPaleobiology
November 21, 2025 at 2:57 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
notthatmarsh.bsky.social
After a few weeks of prep, individual bones are being isolated! Here is a premaxilla and maxilla. #fossilfriday #TriassicPark 🦖🧪
Gray mudstone surrounding tan fossil bones on a blue table Red outline of the front of the snout Red outline of the side of the snout
November 21, 2025 at 6:13 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
whoi.edu
🤔Where is the largest coral colony on Earth? 🪸

It's not in the Great Barrier Reef! It's actually Laloniasi, a 300-year-old coral (Pavona clavus) measuring the size of two basketball courts in the Solomon Islands.

👉Find out why our #ReefSolutions team is studying it: go.whoi.edu/megacoral
November 22, 2025 at 3:00 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
unsmmorrillhall.bsky.social
Happy #FossilFriday! In October, UNSM doubled our holdings of an unusual extinct species, Dasypus bellus, which literally translates to “beautiful armadillo.”✨ It was about twice the size of the modern nine-banded armadillo. These specimens are from 12-25 thousand years ago.🦴
#fossils #paleontology
November 21, 2025 at 10:28 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
nikkimcr.bsky.social
Reporter: Are you affirming that you think the president is a fascist?

Mamdani: I've spoken about --

Trump: Just say yes, it's easier than explaining.
November 21, 2025 at 8:54 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
clarkeocrinus.bsky.social
How about a monster trilobite for #FossilFriday?

This is an Isotelus maximus from the late Ordovician near Cincinnati, Ohio.

The Friends of UMMP purchased this specimen and it is on display @ummnh.bsky.social
November 14, 2025 at 11:01 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
lostbones.bsky.social
🐻Happy #FossilFriday! This canine tooth was found at the bottom of Lake Bronson Reservoir in northern MN after draw down for dam replacement. Flagged in a pedestrian survey, likely from an American black bear (Ursus americanus). The site is pre-contact Native American, submerged nearly 90 years.
The bear tooth in situ, spent nearly 90 years submerged beneath the lake, and an estimated 250 to several thousand years on the landscape before the reservoir’s creation. The bear tooth in situ The bear tooth in the palm of my hand gave me the chill considering it cultural and spiritual significance. Reservoir after draining. The dam, completed in 1937 as part of a Works Progress Administration initiative that began in 1936, transformed the landscape into the current lake reservoir.
November 15, 2025 at 1:30 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
ausarchosaur.bsky.social
These are late Pleistocene canid coprolites from central Mexico with the tooth and bone fragments of pocket gophers. The size might suggest the producer to be a hypercarnivorous fox or small canine. #FossilFriday
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Victor-Bravo-Cuevas/publication/312122099_Canid_Coprolites_from_the_Late_Pleistocene_of_Hidalgo_Central_Mexico_Importance_for_the_Carnivore_Record_of_North_America/links/5b2f97c4aca2720785e0e4ad/Canid-Coprolites-from-the-Late-Pleistocene-of-Hidalgo-Central-Mexico-Importance-for-the-Carnivore-Record-of-North-America.pdf
November 21, 2025 at 10:39 AM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
tomsharperocks.bsky.social
OK, that Lias coprolite maybe isn't the most aesthetically pleasing example for #FossilFriday. In fact it looks a bit s**t. So instead here's some nice-looking Scottish coprolites from the Carboniferous Wardie Shales near Edinburgh which Buckland had made into a table. It's now in Lyme Regis Museum.
Photograph of an early 19th century table top inlaid with 64 cut sections of rounded nodules each containing a fish coprolite within a brass and polished wood surround.
November 21, 2025 at 1:48 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
The holotype of #Stenokranio boldi at the Geoskop Urweltmuseum #fossilfriday
November 21, 2025 at 3:02 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
cenofreak88.bsky.social
#fossilfriday a front leg and teeth of the hippo-like rhino Teleoceras. Found in the late Miocene dove spring formation, Kern County, California. On display at the Red Rock Canyon Visitor Center.

#redrockcanyonstatepark #kerncounty #california #prehistoriccalifornia #fossil #rhino #miocene
November 21, 2025 at 3:58 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
naturenickpics.bsky.social
Basilemys, the great big turtle of late Cretaceous Alberta. The skull and limbs suggest it was a land-dwelling animal, but that low flat shell normally indicates an aquatic turtle species. Was it equally at home in both environments? Something else? Who knows? I sure don’t #FossilFriday
November 21, 2025 at 5:24 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
xrciseguy.bsky.social
#Fossilfriday: Pseudorhina alifera, a species of angel shark from the Upper Jurassic Solnhofen Limestone of Germany. Pseudorhina is the oldest known genus of angel shark (145-150 million years ago.)
November 21, 2025 at 6:49 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
captainfossil.bsky.social
For #FossilFriday: one of the very first fossils of the American mastodon ever discovered. This specimen was found at Big Bone Lick, KY, US, in 1739 by a French military expedition, then sent back to Paris for study. On display at the Galerie de Paléontologie et d’Anatomie comparée in Paris. 🧪
Scruffy bespectacled man in a black long-sleeved shirt and jeans with unkempt hair standing next to a mastodon femur (leg bone) standing upright on a small table (the femur, not the man) in a museum
November 21, 2025 at 6:58 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
kelleypaleolab.bsky.social
Here is Vanderbilt's cast (minus the skull 😭), purchased around 1875 and recently rediscovered in a basement: www.vanderbilt.edu/evolution/re...

Hoping we can restore and display someday -- museum conservationists, on anyone with a spare skull, DM me!

#FossilFriday @evolutionvu.bsky.social
Disassembled cast of Rhomaleosaurus in a storage facility.
November 21, 2025 at 4:21 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
extinctmonsters.bsky.social
The Ward Scientific Company sold these Rhomaleosaurus casts to various museums starting in 1866 (for $150). The original at the National Museum of Ireland was broken up with sledgehammers during a move in the 1920s. #FossilFriday
Relief skeleton of a medium-necked plesiosaur, surrounded by ornate wood trim. Nearly identical plesiosaur cast, in a crowded case with other relief skeletons of marine reptiles, green text banners, and illustrations. Illustration of the same skeleton with a guy pointing a stick at it. Text says Plesiosaurus cramptoni No. 228.
November 21, 2025 at 2:12 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
mosasaurologist.bsky.social
Happy #FossilFriday from this print of the holotype skull of Bison "kansasensis". This copy has gone off to greener pastures, but we're working on another one to assemble and hopefully put in our catalog.
A large bison skull replica that is getting painted many shades of brown for display
November 21, 2025 at 4:52 PM
Reposted by Robert Boessenecker, Dr. of Whaleontology ™️
whaletalesorg.bsky.social
It's #FunFactFriday! #DYK there are 16 species of baleen whales including the Blue, Bowhead, Right, & Humpback? Baleen whales are generally larger than toothed whales & many migrate annually, travelling long distances between cold water feeding areas & warm water breeding areas.
🎨 Peppermint Narwhal
November 21, 2025 at 5:30 PM