Paleontologists from the University of Alberta have discovered a 90-million-year-old species of fish, all thanks to the help of a 10-year-old boy who accidentally stumbled across a fossil.
The child was on a tour at the Monastery of La Candelaria in Colombia, when he noticed something strange on the ground: the shape of a fish in the flagstones.
The boy snapped a photo and showed it to staff at the Centro de Investigaciones Paleontologicas, a local museum that works with the University of Alberta to protect and study regional fossil discoveries. The centre quickly recognized the bizarre shape for what it was: a nearly perfect, intact fossil of an ancient fish.
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The species, called Candelarhynchus padillai, is the first fossil ‘lizard fish’ from the Cretaceous period ever found in Colombia and tropical South America. (University of Alberta Faculty of Science)
Paleontologists Oksana Vernygora (left) and Javier Luque (right) are both PhD candidates at the University of Alberta. (CTV Edmonton)
The fossil was found in the flagstones at the Monastery of La Candelaria in Colombia. (CTV Edmonton)
The staff then shared their findings with the University of Alberta.
"After looking at some images we recognized the importance of the discovery: an entirely brand new group of fish, never seen before in North and South America, and with a few representatives worldwide," Javier Luque, PhD candidate at the University of Alberta and co-author of a study on the fossil, told CTV Edmonton.=READ MORE
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