The late Cretaceous Period, roughly 85 million years ago, had incredible differences as far as our landmasses were concerned. North America had a huge, one thousand mile sea dividing it into two halves, connecting the Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic Ocean, stretching from Georgia and Alabama all the way north into Canada.
This created two landmasses, known as Laramidia to the west and Appalachia to the east. This skeleton suggests that dinosaurs of this species originated in Appalachia and then went on to disperse via land-bridges into other areas of the Americas.
The team was led to believe it was one of the most complete duck-billed dinosaur skeletons ever to be found in the eastern United States. Its teeth show an ability to grind plants similar to cows or horses and are similar to early hadrosaurids, and it allowed them to chew and digest a wide variety of plants.
In an interview with the Tallahassee Democrat, Erickson said: “These dinosaurs eventually became the dominant plant-eaters around the world.”
“It has an excellent skeleton and it has a skull. It is the only primitive hadrosaurid found with a whole skull.” The research team named the dinosaur species Eotrachodon Orientalis.
A rough translation is “dawn rough tooth from the east.” The first duck-billed dinosaur was discovered in 1856 and was named “Trachodon” – a name that Eotrachodon plays homage to.
This discovery also sheds light on the history of dinosaurs and where their remains are more likely to be found. There are areas in Wyoming, Montana, Alberta (in Canada), China, and Africa.
Erickson said with a laugh: “People don't realize there were southern dinosaurs.” There are about a thousand species of dinosaurs, and about forty are identified as “duck-billed.”
Erickson is only one of around three-hundred and fifty professional dinosaur paleontologists working in the world, so there is plenty of work still to be done. “You are most likely to make it into Major League Baseball than do what I do,” Erickson said.
Because of this, most dinosaur remains are found by the public, or by paleontology societies such as the Birmingham chapter that found the duck-billed dinosaur. There are plenty of stories that tell us about kids playing in the woods or near a lake and discovering a set of fossilized bones (much to their utter delight).