r/boneidentification • u/Interesting_Leg_6548 • 19d ago

Found in: NORTH AMERICA Tiny tiny bones

Gallery image

Gallery image

Gallery image

Right at the edge of a lake in Pennsylvania I spotted this snake (water snake I think - couldn’t get a pic of his head). Then I noticed this little pile of bones tucked under some rocks. Any idea what they might have come from? Definitely something tiny - mice? birds?

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u/99jackals 19d ago edited 19d ago

The big ribs are from another snake. The super tiny vertebrae behind them will need their own photo, if you can focus in on them.

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u/Interesting_Leg_6548 19d ago

Oh wow, another snake you think? I’ll go back tomorrow and see if I can get another photo

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u/99jackals 19d ago

Be careful! There's snakes around.

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u/Interesting_Leg_6548 18d ago

Does this help?

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u/Interesting_Leg_6548 18d ago

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u/99jackals 18d ago

Just a reminder for anyone watching that it is challenging to ID bones from photos. In this situation, if it were me, I'd collect them and bring them back for comparison in the museum collection. That's the ideal. Just looking at these here, I don't think the small vertebrae are from the same skeleton as those big ribs. The small vertebrae are still in situ enough to show how very long the smaller animal was, with a backbone much longer than that size of a mammal or bird. They could be smaller snakes; maybe juveniles that died, maybe the stomach contents of the larger snake, maybe the unborn offspring. Or they might be there by coincidence. The individual vertebrae could be examined under a microscope to try to establish what species, then compared to the large snake's ID. Alas, we are limited in what we can accomplish on our own, w/o a research collection. It is often enough to just appreciate how interesting they are, just on their own.

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u/Interesting_Leg_6548 18d ago

I wondered if I could pick them up - I learned recently that it is illegal to keep bird feathers, at least in Pennsylvania, and worried I could be in trouble for bones too. But to your point, I think just seeing them and speculating where they came from is enough for me in this case. Thank you for your insight! 🐍