An amateur fossil hunter has found a rare fragment from the world's oldest marine crocodile during a guided walk along the Jurassic Coast.
Heather Salt was taking part in a guided fossil walk along the Lyme Regis shore in Dorset when she made the amazing discovery – a piece of upper jaw bone from the rare marine crocodylomorph.
“It is a very, very rare find, and fossil collecting has been happening in Lyme Regis for well over 200 years,” Dr Paul Davis, palaeontologist and geology curator at Lyme Regis Museum, told The Independent.
In 2017, a partial skeleton from the crocodylomorph was found in Lyme Regis.
The specimen belongs to the same type of early Jurassic crocodile as Turnersuchus hingleyae. In total, only around 11 specimens of this kind have ever been recorded.
Of these, two are held by the Natural History Museum, one is displayed at Dinosaurland Fossil Museum, and a small number are in private collections.
Lyme Regis Museum itself holds several key examples, including the holotype skeleton and additional referred specimens.
“Unlike the crocodiles we see now, these particular crocodiles we are looking at were truly marine crocodiles. They were fully adapted to life at sea, and they evolved very early on,” the palaeontologist explained.
Speaking about Ms Salt, Dr Davis said: “She wasn’t really sure what it was, she thought it was a piece of wood with nails in it.
“The guide recognised it was a piece of a jaw, but the reason he didn’t think crocodile is because it is so rare. He put a picture on our group chat, and I spotted it and recognised immediately it was.”
Ms Salt offered to donate the fossil to the museum after learning how important it was.
Dr Davis added: “To be fair, she just really wanted to find an ammonite. So I sent her a couple of ammonites from my collection as a thank you.”
“This is exactly why I love my role as a field palaeontologist and fossil walk guide,” walk guide Casey Rich said.
“By teaching the basics, we give people the chance to make their own discoveries, and sometimes that leads to finds that are not only exciting, but important to science. Moments like this will remain with me forever.”
More than two centuries after the pioneering discoveries of Mary Anning, the cliffs and beaches around Lyme Regis continue to reveal fossils that contribute to our understanding of early marine reptiles and prehistoric ecosystems.
The fossil went on display to the public last week, as part of the museum's exhibit on the "Charmouth Crocodile", first discovered in 2017 in nearby Charmouth.
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