The bones of the large marine lizard were found near Courtenay
British Columbia has an official flower, an official bird -- and now we have an official fossil.
Pat Trask, curator of natural history at Courtenay and District Museum and Palaeontology Centre, says there were 7 fossils in the running -- but in the end it was a fossil found in their area that got the most votes:
" And we're pretty excited about it because our Elasmosaur that was discovered in the Puntledge River was one of the 7 candidates to become the provincial fossil. And it turns out that the vorting is in and the Elasmosaur ganrnered 48% of the vote."
Trask says that's a landslide considering the next closest result was the ichthyosaur with 15%.
The Elasmosaur was a marine reptile that lived about 80 million years ago, when Vancouver Island was mostly covered by water.
It was similar in appearance to the legendary Loch Ness Monster:
"It's a marine animal. It's an ocean going lizard. So this one's about 12 metres in length, half of that is neck. It's got like a 5, 6 metre long neck. A turtle shaped body, short tail, and 4 flippers. And at the end of that super long neck is a fairly small head with long pointy teeth for catching fish."
Making the victory sweeter, it was Trasks' twin brother Mike that discovered the fossil in 1988.