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Denver dinosaur discovery keeps getting better — T. rex tooth found among fossils

Danika Worthington | The Denver Post
A picture of the T. rex tooth next to a paint brush for scale. The large dinosaur was likely a scavenger.
Dr. Joe Sertich with the Denver Museum of Nature & Science

Museum workers found a T. rex tooth among the triceratops fossils on Thursday as they excavated prehistoric artifacts from a construction site in Thornton.

The T. rex was likely scavenging and came across the dead triceratops. But the excavators don’t expect to find any more of the large dinosaur — T. rex teeth sometimes fell out as they chowed down.

The Denver Museum of Nature & Science announced the discovery Friday during a press conference where workers opened a plaster cast used to transport the fossils, showing off the horn that alerted construction workers to the presence of the triceratops.

Saunders Construction workers noticed an inch or half of the bone on  Aug. 25, and immediately shut down their earth-moving machines. The museum’s dinosaur curator Joe Sertich said he visited the site the following Monday, expecting to find a couple of small chunks of bone. But within 30 minutes, he found three or four other fossils.


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