What kind of critter used to be around this bone?

[twickster]

I found this bone in a little county park in Pennsylvania, near a stream. The pix (linked to the album so you can just click through in that tab) aren't the greatest, but it's hard to photograph. The first three show it from three different angles, and the fourth is so you can get a sense of how those holes go through.

Any animal anatomists out there? What bone is it, and from what kind of animal?

TIA.

[Colibri]

I believe it's an atlas bone (left), though I am not sure what kind of an animal. The atlas is the topmost bone in the spine.

[twickster]

Neat -- thanks.

Can you even guess as to mammal vs. reptile vs. whatever? It seems too heavy to be avian.

[Colibri]

Definitely mammalian. It has two facets for articulating with the skull. Reptiles and birds (which are technically also reptiles) have only a single articulation.

Based on the measuring tape, it's huge. Just on size, my first guess would be a cow. The image I linked to is from a horse, and it doesn't seem to match that exactly. I think it's too big for deer or a dog.

[Colibri]

This image of a cow skeleton shows the dorsal side of the atlas bone, but it doesn't seem to match that well. Maybe it is a deer.

[twickster]

No -- those are inches, not feet. It's a tad under 4".

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by twickster

No -- those are inches, not feet. It's a tad under 4".

Yes, I know. A human atlas bone may be a couple of inches across. It's huge for an atlas bone.

[Really Not All That Bright]

Originally Posted by twickster

No -- those are inches, not feet. It's a tad under 4".

That's still huge. The atlas is a single cervical vertebra. I think 4" would make it a little over twice the size of a human cervical vertebra, and the atlas is the smallest.

ETA: what Colibri said.

[twickster]

Okay, gotcha.

Deer would make sense -- there are definitely deer in the area. Also sheep in the field across the road, but I don't see how a sheep atlas bone would make it down to where I found it, even if they slaughtered the sheep on the spot.

[Santo Rugger]

Originally Posted by twickster

No -- those are inches, not feet. It's a tad under 4".

And for a second there I thought that was some of the biggest wood grain I've ever seen! Not to mention the widest tape measure!

[Really Not All That Bright]

Originally Posted by twickster

Deer would make sense -- there are definitely deer in the area. Also sheep in the field across the road, but I don't see how a sheep atlas bone would make it down to where I found it, even if they slaughtered the sheep on the spot.

Probably still attached to some of the edible bits when it got there. Are there wolverines, wolves or other largish predators in your area?

[twickster]

Santo -- you hush -- I'm already feeling like a total idiot.

RNATB -- not really. Lots of woods, but its a rural/exurban area -- about an hour north of Philadelphia.

[Xema]

Originally Posted by Colibri

I believe it's an atlas bone ...

And I'm guessing it's called that because it supports the head, in the same way Atlas was supposed to have supported the heavens. (Maybe?)

[Santo Rugger]

Originally Posted by twickster

Santo -- you hush -- I'm already feeling like a total idiot.

Sorry babe, I couldn't help myself. If it makes ya feel any better, I'm like that IRL, too.

[Q.E.D.]

Originally Posted by Xema

And I'm guessing it's called that because it supports the head, in the same way Atlas was supposed to have supported the heavens. (Maybe?)

Precisely.

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by Really Not All That Bright

Probably still attached to some of the edible bits when it got there. Are there wolverines, wolves or other largish predators in your area?

It looks a bit worn or chewed on to me.

Originally Posted by Xema

And I'm guessing it's called that because it supports the head, in the same way Atlas was supposed to have supported the heavens. (Maybe?)

Exactly. The bone I think was first named in humans, referring to it holding up the globelike skull as Atlas was depicted holding up the world.

The next cervical vertebra below it is called the axis. The atlas and axis form a unit, and are rather distinct from the other cervical vertebrae.

[AskNott]

Sheep still fall prey to coyotes and feral dogs, and some just up and die for no apparent reason. If it happens in a stretch of bad weather, scavengers could have it disassembled before the farmer even figures out what happened.

[Shagnasty]

Originally Posted by Colibri

I believe it's an atlas bone (left), though I am not sure what kind of an animal. The atlas is the topmost bone in the spine.

Colibri, this proves once again that you have no idea what you are talking about when it comes to these matters. It is obviously a "face bone" from a very young Pug dog.

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by Shagnasty

Colibri, this proves once again that you have no idea what you are talking about when it comes to these matters. It is obviously a "face bone" from a very young Pug dog.

Actually, I've been putting you all on. It's clearly the pelvis of a garden gnome. It probably was eaten by someone's cat.

[twickster]

Originally Posted by Colibri

It looks a bit worn or chewed on to me.

It's definitely a bit banged up. There is one straight gash in it, though it's not very deep.

As I said, though, I found this in a little park -- no hunting there (though there are privately owned woods on the other side of the creek). Maybe someone field-dressed a deer? People walk their dogs along there, many of them offleash, so a dog could have gotten into some remains.

ETA: Oops, y'all have moved on to other theories. Never mind.

[Really Not All That Bright]

Originally Posted by Colibri

Actually, I've been putting you all on. It's clearly the pelvis of a garden gnome. It probably was eaten by someone's cat.

Somebody ought to show chowder this post.

Originally Posted by twickster

As I said, though, I found this in a little park -- no hunting there (though there are privately owned woods on the other side of the creek). Maybe someone field-dressed a deer? People walk their dogs along there, many of them offleash, so a dog could have gotten into some remains.

I'm a bit sketchy on the details of dressing a kill but I'm fairly certain you'd have to make a collosal hash of the job if there are vertebrae left over.

[Chronos]

Definitely mammalian. It has two facets for articulating with the skull. Reptiles and birds (which are technically also reptiles) have only a single articulation.

By the same standard, aren't mammals technically reptiles, too?

[Q.E.D.]

Originally Posted by Chronos

By the same standard, aren't mammals technically reptiles, too?

Not quite.

[Terrifel]

Originally Posted by Q.E.D.

Not quite.

It appears that birds aren't technically reptiles either.

I still say that mammals are fish, dammit. Can you prove that you're not a fish? No. All you have are cites from other self-hating fish.

Soon taxonomy will see the light, my fellow fish.

[dinoboy]

Originally Posted by Terrifel

I still say that mammals are fish, dammit. Can you prove that you're not a fish? No. All you have are cites from other self-hating fish.

Soon taxonomy will see the light, my fellow fish.

Aww, you Cladist-types think All vertebrates are fish!

Since no one here has positively identified it*, I'll claim it's an Alien bone!



* OK, besides the likelihood of it being a large mammal (and Deer live in the area)

[Terrifel]

Man, you'd think it would be easier to find pictures of cow neck bones online. Aren't cows one of the most eaten animals in America? Where the hell do their necks go afterward? Where are all the novelty cow neckbone paperweights?

Ahh, it's probably a deer neck anyway. Of which there are also mysteriously few pictures on the internet... We may have unwittingly discovered the one thing to which absolutely no unsettling erotic websites are devoted: ungulate cervical vertebrae.

Speaking of unsettling erotic web images, thanks for that disturbing glimpse of sexually exploited Marshmallow peeps, twickster. I really need to learn not to browse through other people's Photobucket albums...

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by Chronos

By the same standard, aren't mammals technically reptiles, too?

No, at least not according to modern classification methods. The ancestors of mammals are the sister group (separate branch) relative to other fully terrestrial vertebrates (amniotes). The other group contains the traditional reptiles (turtles, snakes, lizards, tuatara, and crocodilians) plus birds; some moderan taxonomists now call this latter group (or a subgroup within it) the Reptilia.

Formerly the ancestors of both groups would have been classified as reptiles too; however according to cladisitic taxonomy they would simply be primitive amniotes.

Originally Posted by Terrifel

It appears that birds aren't technically reptiles either.

Well, yes they are, according to modern taxonomists that recognize Reptilia as a named clade. That Wikipedia article is discussing the traditional Reptilia, which being paraphyletic has no validity in cladistic taxonomy.

[Terrifel]

Originally Posted by Colibri

Well, yes they are, according to modern taxonomists that recognize Reptilia as a named clade. That Wikipedia article is discussing the traditional Reptilia, which being paraphyletic has no validity in cladistic taxonomy.

Ah, but your remark implies that there are also modern taxonomists who don't recognize Reptilia as a named clade. So according to those modern taxonomists, are birds technically reptiles? Are birds part of that paraphyletic group which they do not recognize? That would be a neat trick. Almost as neat as waking up as a fish, wouldn't you say?

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by Terrifel

Ah, but your remark implies that there are also modern taxonomists who don't recognize Reptilia as a named clade. So according to those modern taxonomists, are birds technically reptiles?

No, but if they don't recognize Reptilia, then they don't recognize "reptiles" as a group at all. So in their view, there is no such thing as a reptile. But they would recognize another clade, with a different name, that includes both traditional reptiles and birds.

I am not aware of any modern taxonomists that do not think that birds and traditional reptiles are within the same clade; the question is what to call it.

[Terrifel]

Originally Posted by Colibri

No, but if they don't recognize Reptilia, then they don't recognize "reptiles" as a group at all. So in their view, there is no such thing as a reptile.

Seriously? If a taxonomist doesn't recognize Animalia, then in their view there are no such things as animals?

More importantly, do you think that people will be fish in your lifetime?








ETA: If the "Animalia/animal" thing can't be answered easily, then don't worry about it; I wasn't all that serious, and the knowledge will do me absolutely no good whatsoever in any case. I am curious about your opinion on the fish thing though.

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by Terrifel

Seriously? If a taxonomist doesn't recognize Animalia, then in their view there are no such things as animals?

I believe you know enough about classification that I am sure you are just being facetious. I was obviously talking about "reptiles" in the technical sense, that is, as a taxonomic category. Even if you don't recognize such a taxonomic category, you can refer to the snakes, lizards, turtles, and crocodiles as "reptiles" in the popular sense. You can also refer to seaweeds or fungi as plants, even though they don't belong to the moderan Plantae.

More importantly, do you think that people will be fish in your lifetime?

In the popular sense, or the cladistic sense?

[carnivorousplant]

Originally Posted by Colibri

pelvis of a garden gnome. It probably was eaten by someone's cat.

Nadia frequently catches them in the garden. I release those that I am able to get away from her alive at the Mall.

[Terrifel]

Originally Posted by Colibri

In the popular sense, or the cladistic sense?

In the same sense that birds are reptiles. Which would make birds fish too, I guess.

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by Terrifel

ETA: If the "Animalia/animal" thing can't be answered easily, then don't worry about it; I wasn't all that serious, and the knowledge will do me absolutely no good whatsoever in any case.

Maybe you weren't being facetious. Most biologists today would recognize a clade called Animalia that includes the multicellular animals. Some would exclude the sponges, which traditionally have been called animals.

The Plantae as a clade probably would include the multicellular green plants, plus the green algae, including unicellular groups.

The Fungi also mostly belong to one clade.

The Kingdom "Protista" however is another paraphyletic group, made up of dozens of different clades of unicellular organisms, each of which deserve Kingdom rank if Animalia, Plantae, and Fungi are considered Kingdoms.

I am curious about your opinion on the fish thing though.

"Fish" is a popular term that has no taxonomic validity at all. It includes the Agnatha (lampreys and hagfish), Chondreichthyes (sharks and rays), and Osteichthyes (bony fish).

Now the lungfish are more closely related to the tetrapods (land vertebrates) than they are to the other bony fish. If you include the lungfish among the bony fish, then the tetrapods, including us are within this group. So we are Osteichthyes, but since "fish" doesn't correspond to any clade we are not fish.

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by Terrifel

In the same sense that birds are reptiles. Which would make birds fish too, I guess.

Birds are reptiles if you have a named clade Reptilia. Of course they are not reptiles in the popular sense.

No one has suggested a named clade equivalent to "fish." Any clade that includes all "fish" in the popular sense also includes all vertebrates, so you might as well just call it Vertebrata.

[Terrifel]

Originally Posted by Colibri

"Fish" is a popular term that has no taxonomic validity at all. It includes the Agnatha (lampreys and hagfish), Chondreichthyes (sharks and rays), and Osteichthyes (bony fish).

Now the lungfish are more closely related to the tetrapods (land vertebrates) than they are to the other bony fish. If you include the lungfish among the bony fish, then the tetrapods, including us are within this group. So we are Osteichthyes, but since "fish" doesn't correspond to any clade we are not fish.

Now wait a second here. There are "hagfish" and "bony fish," but no "fish?" I call shenanigans. You can't call something a "bony fish" and then turn around and say there are no fish. You and cladistics are just trying to cloud the issue. You're going to look people in the eye and tell them straight out that the group defined specifically as "bony fish" contains no fish?

This kind of implies that taxonomy has more or less given up on making sense to anyone other than taxonomists.

[carnivorousplant]

Originally Posted by Colibri

No one has suggested a named clade equivalent to "fish." Any clade that includes all "fish" in the popular sense also includes all vertebrates, so you might as well just call it Vertebrata.

So what are these killifish (egg laying toothed carps) I hang out with?

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by Terrifel

Now wait a second here. There are "hagfish" and "bony fish," but no "fish?" I call shenanigans. You can't call something a "bony fish" and then turn around and say there are no fish. You and cladistics are just trying to cloud the issue. You're going to look people in the eye and tell them straight out that the group defined specifically as "bony fish" contains no fish?

Terrifel, I'm not sure if you are joking, going for a whoosh, or being intentionally obtuse. I don't believe you actually don't understand what I have been saying. There is no such thing as a "fish" in a technical taxonomic sense, that is a group that contains lampreys, sharks, and trout and nothing else. Of course there are "fish" in a popular sense. And it is possible to define clades among the, let us say, "fishlike vertebrates" by using modifiers, such as the jawless fish or the cartilaginous fish.

This kind of implies that taxonomy has more or less given up on making sense to anyone other than taxonomists.

Taxonomy hasn't made sense to anyone other than taxonomists since the days of Linnaeus. Once an evolutionary framework was imposed, whales were no longer "fish" and spiders were no longer in the same group as insects. You are just used to these technical, non-intuitive classifications. So this sort of thing is really not new. It just makes you uncomfortable because it differs from what you were first taught.

[astro]

Twickster's bone looks far too massive to be a deer bone

[achilles bogart]

Originally Posted by astro

Twickster's bone looks far too massive to be a deer bone

And too small for a mammoth. Cow Atlas is on the right, so unless some pieces were worn off the bone (entirely possible) it wouldn't be cow. Elk or horse maybe? It is really hard to do any ID as the photos are blurry.

[Terrifel]

Originally Posted by Colibri

Terrifel, I'm not sure if you are joking, going for a whoosh, or being intentionally obtuse. I don't believe you actually don't understand what I have been saying. There is no such thing as a "fish" in a technical taxonomic sense, that is a group that contains lampreys, sharks, and trout and nothing else. Of course there are "fish" in a popular sense. And it is possible to define clades among the, let us say, "fishlike vertebrates" by using modifiers, such as the jawless fish or the cartilaginous fish.

Well, as I said earlier, I was not being too serious, and I'm kind of disappointed that no one has shown up with a picture of a deer neck bone yet. I actually found pictures of a couple examples, but I have no way to scan them; sorry. They're on pp. 150-151 of Vertebrate Fossils: A Neophyte's Guide by Frank A. Kocsis Jr, for those playing along at home. Frank's examples are from the Pleistocene, but they look to be a reasonable match to my untutored eye. However they both only measure 3'' wide. On the other hand, the atlas of the modern bison (which I assume, without any real attempt to check, is closer in proportion to modern domestic cattle) is 8'' wide, so it seems like a deer might be the better guess after all.

On preview, I see astro managed to scare up some deer neck photos! Bravo! On the other hand, that was apparently an 8-month old deer whose atlas was deformed to begin with, so some variation is perhaps to be expected.

Anyhoo, the real issue here is why modern taxonomy continues to dance around the issue of people being fish. Look at you, using carefully parsed evasions like "fishlike vertebrates." Yet earlier you had no trouble conceding that "we are Osteichthyes," and you also defined Osteichthyes as "bony fish..." immediately after assuring us that taxonomists don't recognize the term "fish."

Originally Posted by Colibri

"Fish" is a popular term that has no taxonomic validity at all. It includes the Agnatha (lampreys and hagfish), Chondreichthyes (sharks and rays), and Osteichthyes (bony fish).

I'm sorry, "bony" what? I didn't quite catch that, could you repeat it a bit louder, without the parentheses? You say we Osteichthyes are "bony," I got that... but "bony" what? What else are we besides bony?

Say it. Say you're a fish.

SAY IT.

Taxonomy hasn't made sense to anyone other than taxonomists since the days of Linnaeus. Once an evolutionary framework was imposed, whales were no longer "fish" and spiders were no longer in the same group as insects. You are just used to these technical, non-intuitive classifications. So this sort of thing is really not new. It just makes you uncomfortable because it differs from what you were first taught.

It makes me uncomfortable? I'm not the one running away from the logical conclusion here. Or should I say "swimming?"

And I think you're overstating the obscurity of Linnaean taxonomy. Every kid knows that whales aren't fish; that's because Linnaeus could give them a list of distinct characteristics explaining why they aren't fish. Go out and ask a 10-year old whether a whale is a fish or not. But now whales are fish again... Opps, "bony fish." Only modern taxonomy has no interest in explaining why whales are bony fish, or even admitting that whales are fish. Instead they prefer to claim that fish don't exist.

So I'm mostly sad for that little kid who just won a goldfish at the state fair, and who might have run up to a taxonomist to show it off, as kids often do. "Look what I got!" he would cry, face alight with pride and wonder, holding up the little bowl. "What kind of fish is this?" And the Linnaean taxonomist would kneel down and tell the child about goldfish, and explain their domestication from Asian carp, and point out the features that show how that child's humble goldfish is related to the mighty shark, and how more distant relatives evolved new features to become frogs, and reptiles, and even people. And the child would look at that goldfish with new eyes, and his wondering mind would be opened to a life appreciating all the interconnected intricacy and mystery of nature.

But no longer. Now that big-eyed kid runs up to you, and asks you to tell him what fish it is, and you look at him with stern contempt and declare: "There is no fish."

And that kid's huge puppy eyes fill with confusion and hurt and tears, and he runs away in shame, having learned never to trust again. And that memory festers into a phobia of sharing experiences; he becomes bitter and introverted, unwilling to acknowledge doubt; scornful and contemptuous of those around them.

And when he hits college, he eventually gravitates to taxonomy, so it all works out after all. And he spends the rest of his life terrorizing children: "Say, what's your favorite fish? WRONG! There ARE no fish! What's the difference between birds and reptiles? WRONG! Trick question! Go get me the belt."

[Carson O'Genic]

Originally Posted by twickster;10794259
[B

RNATB[/b] -- not really. Lots of woods, but its a rural/exurban area -- about an hour north of Philadelphia.

So brown bear could be considered.

[twickster]

Originally Posted by astro

Twickster's bone looks far too massive to be a deer bone

As Terrifel noted in the middle of that brilliant rant, the cite involves one from a fawn with "issues" -- plus I don't see an indication of the size. (Will admit I didn't read carefully, though.)

Originally Posted by achilles bogart

And too small for a mammoth. Cow Atlas is on the right, so unless some pieces were worn off the bone (entirely possible) it wouldn't be cow. Elk or horse maybe? It is really hard to do any ID as the photos are blurry.

Shall I take some more pix? I didn't realize how blurry the first set was till I was looking at them on the computer.

Originally Posted by Carson O'Genic

So brown bear could be considered.

I don't think so. "An hour from Philly" isn't all that far. This is up in Bucks County, about ten minutes north of Doylestown, for those who know the area -- previously mostly farmland, with some additional development before the recent changes in the housing market. AFAIK, no bears -- the patches of forest aren't dense or substantial enough to support them, I don't think. Of course, I don't live up there -- this is near where I used to work.

[Colibri]

Originally Posted by Terrifel

Anyhoo, the real issue here is why modern taxonomy continues to dance around the issue of people being fish. Look at you, using carefully parsed evasions like "fishlike vertebrates." Yet earlier you had no trouble conceding that "we are Osteichthyes," and you also defined Osteichthyes as "bony fish..." immediately after assuring us that taxonomists don't recognize the term "fish."

I'm sorry, "bony" what? I didn't quite catch that, could you repeat it a bit louder, without the parentheses? You say we Osteichthyes are "bony," I got that... but "bony" what? What else are we besides bony?

You're the one who started nitpicking over an offhand comment about birds being reptiles. I'm not dancing around about anything; you persist in deliberately misconstruing what I said. "Fish," without a modifier, is not a clade; it is a paraphyletic group. When I brought up Osteichthyes I should have mentioned it is a traditional group like reptiles, and also paraphyletic when tetrapods are excluded. It would not be recognized by cladistic taxonomists, so they would not recognize "bony fish" either, any more than reptiles or fish. Now you could recognize a clade called Osteichthyes (and many taxonomists do) that does include tetrapods, and in this sense humans are bony fish. If you want to start off with hagfish, then all vertebrates are fish.

To be clear, birds are not reptiles in the popular sense, although they are reptiles in a technical sense.

If you insist, humans are not fish in the popular sense, although they are bony fish in a technical sense. All existing vertebrates are fish in the technical sense.

Say it. Say you're a fish.

SAY IT.

Define fish. What, specifically, is your understanding of what the term means? In what sense do you mean it? If you are using it in a technical sense, what are the defining characteristics of the group?

Are starfish fish? Cuttlefish? Shellfish? Actually, since vertebrates are in the same clade as starfish, I suppose you can say we are starfish.

It makes me uncomfortable? I'm not the one running away from the logical conclusion here. Or should I say "swimming?"

And I think you're overstating the obscurity of Linnaean taxonomy. Every kid knows that whales aren't fish; that's because Linnaeus could give them a list of distinct characteristics explaining why they aren't fish.

"Every kid knows" that solely because it has been taught in school for a long time. It is non-intuitive, and does not fit folk taxonomy.

I can also give you a similar list of why birds are reptiles and mammals are not. Birds and traditional reptiles both have a single occipital condyle, while in mammals it's double (the characteristic that set this whole discussion off), a basic phalangeal formula of 2-3-4-5-3 (though bird have lost the last digit), which is 2-3-3-3-3 in mammals; a single ear ossicle where mammals have three; the same type of jaw articulation; and so on. This may be more obscure than "has hair and feeds its young with milk," but they are the kinds of characteristics on which classifications are based.

Go out and ask a 10-year old whether a whale is a fish or not. But now whales are fish again... Opps, "bony fish." Only modern taxonomy has no interest in explaining why whales are bony fish, or even admitting that whales are fish. Instead they prefer to claim that fish don't exist.

So I'm mostly sad for that little kid who just won a goldfish at the state fair, and who might have run up to a taxonomist to show it off, as kids often do. "Look what I got!" he would cry, face alight with pride and wonder, holding up the little bowl. "What kind of fish is this?" And the Linnaean taxonomist would kneel down and tell the child about goldfish, and explain their domestication from Asian carp, and point out the features that show how that child's humble goldfish is related to the mighty shark, and how more distant relatives evolved new features to become frogs, and reptiles, and even people. And the child would look at that goldfish with new eyes, and his wondering mind would be opened to a life appreciating all the interconnected intricacy and mystery of nature.

But no longer. Now that big-eyed kid runs up to you, and asks you to tell him what fish it is, and you look at him with stern contempt and declare: "There is no fish."

And that kid's huge puppy eyes fill with confusion and hurt and tears, and he runs away in shame, having learned never to trust again. And that memory festers into a phobia of sharing experiences; he becomes bitter and introverted, unwilling to acknowledge doubt; scornful and contemptuous of those around them.

And when he hits college, he eventually gravitates to taxonomy, so it all works out after all. And he spends the rest of his life terrorizing children: "Say, what's your favorite fish? WRONG! There ARE no fish! What's the difference between birds and reptiles? WRONG! Trick question! Go get me the belt."

Amusing, perhaps, but just plain silly. Did your eyes really fill with confusion and hurt tears just because I called bird reptiles up above?

OK, so you don't like cladistic taxonomy. What system do you propose in its stead? Do you really want to stick with Linnaean taxonomy? Why not Aristotelian?

Actually, this is probably enough of a hijack for this thread. If you really want further discussion of this, I would suggest starting a thread on it in GQ, GD, or, considering that you have such strong feelings on the matter, perhaps the Pit. I would be happy to discuss it further, but we've gotten well off track here.

[Carptracker]

I dismantle half a dozen or so whitetail deer every year, and that bone is far too large to be a cervid cervical part - at least any locally extant species. Elk were native there historically, but have been extirpated.

And it can't be a brown bear either, unless someone transported the bone there or one got really lost. You mean black bear - that would be a reasonable conjecture, although I consider it unlikely.

To me, Occam's razor says cow, or maybe horse, even if the pics don't look right to us. Just saying. Or the pic has fooled us and it is not really an atlas, although I think Colibri has it right.

Even if a hunter brought home an elk carcass from parts west, he would not bring home the atlas unless he wanted to mount the head, in which case it seems unlikely the bone would end up in the park. Hunters often give the bones to their dogs, but the atlas usually gets left with the head, or at least most of it does.

[Really Not All That Bright]

Originally Posted by twickster

As Terrifel noted in the middle of that brilliant rant, the cite involves one from a fawn with "issues" -- plus I don't see an indication of the size. (Will admit I didn't read carefully, though.)

By massive, I believe he was referring to the actual bulk of the bone, rather than the size. The white-tailed deer vertebra shown is a bit flatter than yours (the one in your picture, that is, not one of the vertebrae in your spine, I mean) and thinner.

I don't think it's bovine, either. Here's an artist's rendering of a cow vertebra:
http://lady-athanasia.deviantart.com...ebrae-67477327
Obviously, it's from a completely different angle, and it's not the atlas, so it has a body (the body of the atlas vertebra is fused into the axis), but as you can see it's more like the one from the deer than the one you found.

Here's one from a horse, and it's not that either:
http://www.pyrr.net/atlas.jpg

ETA: The fact that a cow atlas is apparently thinner than the one you found implies that yours came from something heavier, or at least thicker-set, than your average bovine. Eek!

Double ETA: I just found a picture of an atlas from an extinct cave bear on eBay, of all places: http://cgi.ebay.com/Genuine-Fossil-e...31110008r10174
I don't know how closely related Old and New World bears are, but to my untrained eye it looks vastly more similar than any of the other candidates. Colibri?

[achilles bogart]

Originally Posted by twickster

Shall I take some more pix? I didn't realize how blurry the first set was till I was looking at them on the computer.

Some new pictures would be good. If you can get some side shots as well.

[Carptracker]

You know, you have me wonderkng now. As I noted, a hunter usually leaves the atlas attached to the skull, so I don't get a close look at that part that often. And I'm less likely to try to get at the atlas of a large buck, because things are just tougher in there.

Not-too-bright's astute mention of the thickness compared to a cow makes me think that maybe a buck (which has antlers, and fights with them) might have an inordinantly tough atlas, and larger than that of a doe. The lower vertebrae are not nearly that big, but perhaps the atlas on a large buck widens hugely compared to the rest of the vertebrae. It's possible, and given the other options being so unlikely....

[Sunspace]

Originally Posted by Colibri

Actually, I've been putting you all on. It's clearly the pelvis of a garden gnome. It probably was eaten by someone's cat.

Could be worse. Could have been taken down by a roil of smurfs.

[Really Not All That Bright]

Reason #too-many-to-count why I love the Dope: in a thread about identifying critter remains, we've got a naturalist (or two?), a couple of hunters, and lots of people with the Google-fu (including me- I know plenty about human anatomy, but next to nothing about identifying animal remains).