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Dinosaur Eggs Discovered in Chechnya

14 April 2012 02:21 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Participants of a geographic expedition in Russiaâ€™s North Caucasus Chechen Republic have uncovered a batch of alleged dinosaur egg fossils, the Vesti Respubliki online daily said on Friday, APA reports quoting Ria Novosti.

â€œWe were exploring the site [a pristine area in Chechnyaâ€™s Sharoyski District], when one of us stumbled upon regular-shaped spheres lying on the nearby rocks. Proceeding from their form, we supposed that these are egg fossils,â€ Lifenews online tabloid quoted expedition member Said-Emin Dzhabrailov, who heads Chechen State Universityâ€™s Landscape Explorations Laboratory, as saying.

â€œWith 90-percent certainty we say that we found dinosaur eggs. We are presently holding a series of tests and will soon make a final conclusion,â€ Dzhabrailov continued.

He said there were some forty egg fossils with diameters varying between 24 and 100 centimeters in the batch. â€œThe cross-section view [of one of the eggs] shows that its shell, yolk and albumen are quite well-circumscribed. We took several samples to check out the fossilsâ€™ physical and chemical composition,â€ Dzhabrailov said.

Scientists believe the eggs were laid by an herbivorous dinosaur that lived some 60 million years ago.

Chechen geologists want to hold a roundtable dedicated to their one-off discovery and invite Russian paleontologists. This is the first ever such finding in Chechnya.