Badlands Dinosaur Museum specimen key to world-wide mating harm research – The Dickinson Press

DICKINSON — A specimen on show on the Badlands Dinosaur Museum in Dickinson, North Dakota, often known as “Warwick’s Duck,” has been prominently featured in a world analysis paper.

The analysis paper, authored by Filippo Bertozzo, Ph.D., research rear spinal accidents in “duckbilled” dinosaurs. “Duckbilled,” or hadrosaurs, are a big household of plant-eating dinosaurs named for the duck-bill form of the bones of their snouts.

The research seems at rear spinal accidents of many various hadrosaur specimens from around the globe to determine the causes of the accidents.

It concludes by detailed analysis in addition to by using laptop simulations the rear spinal accidents have been doubtlessly brought on by mating accidents.

“Statistics and computer simulation of bone stress led the international team of paleontologists to suggest that the bone fractures were caused by the male crushing the backbones of the female during mating,” a press launch saying the paper’s publication stated.

Listed as co-authors on the paper, Elizabeth Freedman-Fowler, dean of utilized science at Dickinson State University, and her husband, Denver Fowler, curator of the Badlands Dinosaur Museum, defined the importance of the findings to the Dickinson Press.

Evan Butow / The Dickinson Press

“All of the specimens that show this injury should be female, they should all show some of the features that we’re suggesting might be female,” Fowler stated. “And if that was the case that would be a great test so it helps us along the way for potentially being able to tell male and female dinosaurs apart.”

Both scientists voiced warning, nevertheless, explaining that additional independently researched proof can be wanted to find out the dinosaurs’ intercourse and that the rear spinal accidents couldn’t solely be used to differentiate between female and male dinosaurs.

In 2016, shortly after he began because the curator of the Badlands Dinosaur Museum, Fowler put collectively an exhibit that includes the specimen, “Warwick’s Duck,” — on mortgage from the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, Montana.

“Warwick’s Duck” is a hadrosaur fossil discovered by Fowler’s father, Warwick Fowler, at present on show on the Badlands Dinosaur Museum.

Evan Butow / The Dickinson Press

Fowler informed the Dickinson Press the fossil discovered by his father was probably the greatest examples of the hypothesized mating accidents he had ever seen.

“When my dad found this specimen in 2009 I thought straight away like this looks like these kinds of mating injuries,” he stated. “It was like the best one I’d ever seen.”

Fowler stated the exhibit shortly attracted the eye of Darren Tanke of the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology in Drumheller, Alberta, Canada, whom he stated had been cataloguing comparable accidents in fossils for years.

Freedman-Fowler stated she joined the undertaking shortly afterwards and the three offered an outline of “Warwick’s Duck” in 2019 at a paleontology convention in Dickinson, N.D.

Evan Butow / The Dickinson Press

In attendance on the convention was Bertozzo, on the time a Doctoral pupil in Ireland.

“He was working on this as part of his PhD and he was really excited to come and see. So he came and saw the specimen and we agreed to be part of a bigger paper that he was publishing looking at more than just the few specimens that we’ve collected,” Fowler stated.

According to Fowler, Bertozzo has studied comparable specimens everywhere in the world, together with as far-off as Russia. Co-authors on the paper embody scientists from international locations akin to Russia, Italy, and the United Kingdom.

Released on Nov. 4, 2025, readers can entry the analysis paper on-line by iScience, an open-source scientific journal.

“Warwick’s Duck” might be seen on the Badlands Dinosaur Museum. More info on the museum’s contents and hours of operation might be discovered on their web site and social media channels.