Canada's first known dinosaurs: Palaeontology and collecting history of upper Cretaceous vertebrates in Southern Alberta and Saskatchewan, 1874-1889

The early collecting history of dinosaurs and other fossil vertebrates in
Western Canada during the 1870s and 1880s is poorly documented. Initial
finds were made by the British North American Boundary Commission and the
Geological Survey of Canada in modern Saskatchewan and Alberta but, beyond
a few well-publicized examples, little is known about precisely what was
found and where. Much of the collected material is now housed in the
collections of the Canadian Museum of Nature in Gatineau, Quebec, and a
recent survey of these historic finds allows for the first comprehensive
narrative regarding their identity and procurement. The collection is
heavily biased towards vertebral centra and phalanges, reflective of both
taphonomic and collecting biases. Given current understanding of Upper
Cretaceous assemblages of North America, ornithomimids and small theropods
are overrepresented, whereas ceratopsids and ankylosaurs are
underrepresented. Fossils from the Belly River Group are best represented,
after repeated visits to the areas of present-day Dinosaur Provincial Park
and Ross Coulee near Irvine, Alberta. Taxonomic identification of the
material has yielded numerous first Canadian occurrences, in addition to
some first global occurrences. The latter include the first ever
occurrences of Caenagnathidae (1884) and Thescelosauridae (1889). The
Upper Cretaceous fossil record of Western Canada is among the richest in
the world, and has been thoroughly studied over the last century. These
fossils have informed our understanding of dinosaur behaviour, taphonomy,
ecology, diversity dynamics, and extinction, among other aspects. But,
like the animals themselves, the story of Canada’s dinosaur-hunting legacy
had humble beginnings—a story that has not been fully revealed before now.