(South Dakota News Watch) A Tyrannosaurus rex fossil discovered on a ranch in western South Dakota will be auctioned off in New York City on Tuesday with a possible sale price of $30 million or more.
The 38-foot long skeleton, nicknamed Gus, stands more than 12 feet tall and has one of the most complete T. rex skeletons ever found. According to Sotheby’s auction house, which is handling the sale, Gus could bring one of the highest sale prices ever for a dinosaur fossil.
The dinosaur is from the late Cretaceous Period and was believed to have lived on Earth 67 million years ago.
The Harding County ranch where the skeleton was found lies in the famed Hell Creek Formation, a geological region of northwestern South Dakota and parts of Montana, North Dakota and Wyoming where dinosaur finds are fairly common.
Several other major dinosaur finds have been made there, including Sue, the famous T. rex discovered in 1990. After legal wrangling over ownership, Sue was auctioned in 1997 at a sale price of $8.3 million to the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, where it remains today.
The first piece of Gus, a metatarsal from the dinosaur’s foot, was found in 2021 sticking out of the ground on a Harding County ranch owned by Gary and Dana Licking. The find was made by paleontologists with Theropoda Expeditions, a Texas company specializing in commercial excavation, preparation and mounting of dinosaur fossils.
The skeleton prepared for sale is mounted in a predatory pose held up by metal rods hovering slightly above a large steel platform.
The skull of Gus is 54 inches long and has 82% of possible bones present. Marks on the skeleton reveal it was bitten in the head by another T. rex at some point and has other injuries indicated by bone fractures or areas of healing, according to Sotheby’s.
The fossil consists of 183 bone elements, making up 61% of the possible bones in the dinosaur’s body and representing 75% to 80% of the original bone mass by weight, Sotheby’s said.
The dinosaur Sue is 40 feet long and 13 feet tall and is considered the largest and most complete T. rex skeleton ever discovered at 90% of possible bone mass.
A 5-year journey of discovery
A Sotheby’s spokeswoman referred News Watch to the company’s media team, which did not respond to an email. According to a video on the Sotheby’s website, it took three years to extract the skeleton and another two years to prepare and assemble it.
“This is our longest-term project ever,” Cassandra Hatton, worldwide head of Sotheby’s Science & Natural History division, said in the video. “From the day the first bone was discovered, we’ve been going back and forth to South Dakota to oversee this whole process.”
The lowest opening bid accepted will be $19 million, with an estimated sale price up to $30 million or more depending on buyer interest, Sotheby’s said.
Gus is named after rancher Gary Licking, whose nickname was Gus. Licking died at age 67 in February 2022, before the full extent of the T. rex skeleton was known.
Gary and Dana Licking married in 1983 and lived on their family ranch 11 miles west of Buffalo, according to Gary’s obituary.
Rancher pleased with paleontology process
Dana Licking said in the Sotheby’s video that she was impressed at the level of skill and professionalism displayed by the paleontologists who discovered the skeleton.
“I’m really grateful that they found it because it could have been lost and nobody ever would learn anything about it,” she said. “To make it come to life takes a lot of love and care and dedication, and they stopped at nothing to make that happen.”
Thomas Heitkamp, president of Theropoda Expeditions, said he and his team members camped on the Licking property for five months each year as they worked a grid that extended up to 70 feet in multiple directions and included removal of nearly 1,000 artifacts.
“What is out in the hills is all that will ever exist, and finding it is critical to preserving it,” Heitkamp said in the video. “You’re dealing with material that has been a part of the earth for a very, very long time and it has no interest in cooperating — it wants to stay there.”
Cassandra Hatton, vice chairman of Sotheby’s Science & Natural History division, was not available for an interview with News Watch, a company spokesperson said.
But in a recent video interview with Reuters, Hatton explained the reasons for the high estimated value of Gus.
“Gus is one of the biggest and most complete T. rexes ever found,” Hatton told Reuters. “The completeness, the quality, the size, the preservation.”
Hatton said the process to excavate Gus was arduous and time-consuming.
“What is really important for people to understand when we’re talking about dinosaur fossils is that they don’t come out of the ground complete,” Hatton said. “It takes highly specialized, careful, diligent, skilled people to recognize what they’re looking at, to tell the difference between a piece of rock and a piece of this animal. The time and the care that is taken to do it correctly – that is a big part of what makes this what it is.”
Prices rising ‘exponentially’
Walter Stein, owner of PaleoAdventures in Belle Fourche, in western South Dakota, is an independent paleontologist who is also working to uncover fossils in the Hell Creek Formation.
Stein’s first reaction to the news of the finding and pending sale of Gus was, “I’m jealous,” as he is doing field work on a ranch not far from where Gus was discovered.
Western South Dakota is likely to remain a hotbed for discovery of dinosaur fossils, said Stein, who last year opened the Dinosaurs of the Hell Creek Museum in Belle Fourche, a 6,500 square-foot museum with a working paleontology lab, interactive exhibits and dinosaur displays.
“Finding a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton with 183 bones doesn’t happen every day,” he said. “But we’ve got the perfect conditions here with bones near the surface, significant private land to explore and relatively good weather (for paleontology.)”
Stein said the auction of Gus could lead to a purchase by either a museum or a private individual or group.
But it is unlikely an American museum would have the funding to acquire Gus because many are struggling or struggling financially, Stein said. Across the world, however, interest remains high in major fossils in countries where funding may be more accessible, such as in Japan, Korea, China, Dubai, Saudi Arabia or in Europe, Stein said.
“On the one hand, I would love for this and every fossil I collect to go to a museum,” he said. “However, there’s so many dinosaur specimens and skeletons on display, it’s not going to affect the science that much if it ends up in private hands.”
The price tag for T. rexes and other dinosaur fossils has risen “exponentially” in recent years as demand, interest and appreciation for ancient fossils has grown, Stein said.
“It’s also the simple fact that dinosaurs are cool, a kind of living art,” he said. “Seeing the whole of a T. rex is a life-changing experience for some people.”
