In the photo: Bones of a pterodactyl cub, top right. Below left is a petrified fern
Recently, the Pavlograd Museum of Local Lore and History got a unique exhibit - a piece of rock raised from a coal mine, into which the skeleton of a baby pterodactyl (a species of extinct reptiles of the order of flying dinosaurs - pterosaurs) has grown. A body with long legs and a tail is clearly visible on the surface of the stone.
“The elongated forelegs with claws are very clearly visible through the magnifying glass. And a cartilaginous tail is noticeable. And next to it is a petrified twig of a fern,”Tatiana Vedmid, director of the museum, told us.
Historians explain the small size of a possible pterodactyl by the fact that flying lizards were born small. “Some species had even fewer eggs than chicken eggs. When the cubs hatched from the eggs, they were in such a crooked position and very small. It was only later that they grew up to five or more meters,”explained the director of the museum. According to preliminary estimates of local historians, the age of the find reaches 300 million years.
It should be noted that it is still believed that pterodactyls did not live at all on the territory of modern Ukraine.
A relic of prehistoric times at a depth of three hundred meters, miner Yuri Sashchenko discovered 15 years ago. He liked the breed with intricate patterns and decided to take it home.
“I was interested in a large fern, and I carved this stone for a long time. The hacksaw was blunt, and it took a long time, but I got it all the same,”Yuri recalls. Neither the miner himself nor his household even really looked at the unusual animal to the right of the fern, and for many years the picturesque stone lay in the sideboard as a decoration. And recently, the family decided to donate the find to the local museum. It was then that the museum workers revealed to the Sashchenko couple the truth about the "souvenir" kept at their home. “This is so unexpected! I could not even imagine that we have a pterodactyl chick in our sideboard! " - the miner's wife Irina Sashchenko is surprised.
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Photo: segodnya.ua
Doubters
But the Kiev experts, who were shown a photo of the find, believe that these are the remains of animals, however, marine ones. “Both objects are most likely the remains of crinoids (sea lilies, animals like that). They, like vertebrates, had an internal skeleton. The find is very rare, although not as sensational as the pterodactyl. The safety of the samples is wonderful, and expertise is required,”an assistant of the Department of General and Historical Geology of the Kiev National University named after T. Shevchenko Lilia Popova.
In turn, Pavlograd historians are now preparing the exhibit for examination in order to finally figure out what kind of miracle they were presented with.