The Mint has created its first glow-in-the-dark coin, a quarter featuring a dinosaur discovered near Grand Prairie, Alta. in 1973.
In the light, the quarter features the Pachyrhinosaurus lakustai dinosaur, named after Al Lakusta, the man who stumbled on its bones in the Pipestone Creek bonebed.
When the lights go off, the dinosaur’s glowing skeleton is revealed.
The Mint only made 25,000 of these photoluminescent coins. It plans to release three more glow-in-the-dark coins featuring prehistoric creatures.
Apparently, the glowing effect won’t wear off.
While the quarters have a face value of 25 cents, they will be on sale online and at Canada Post locations for $29.95.
The Pachyrhinosaurus lakustai dinosaur coin is the first in a 4-coin Prehistoric Creature glow-in-the-dark (photo-luminescent) series! Turn off the lights and discover the Pachyrhinosaurus’s glowing skeleton! Designs approved by the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology.
Pachyrhinosaurus lakustai
The frst Pachyrhinosaurus was unearthed and named by C.M. Sternberg in 1946, from the St. Mary Formation of Southwestern Alberta. Sternberg later described the specimen as Pachyrhinosaurus canadensis in 1950.
Pachyrhinosaurus was an ornithischian dinosaur, belonging to the larger group of ceratopsians, (horned, herbivorous dinosaurs). It lived in the Late Cretaceous of North America, about 72-68 million years ago.
Pachyrhinosaurus was a fairly large animal, like the present day rhinoceros, reaching up to 23 feet in length. As its name suggests, it had a thick (pachy) bony knob on its nose (rhino) rather than a horn. Its relatively broad skull had a short crest or frill on the back.
Al Lakusta, a Grande Prairie science teacher found the bonebed along Pipestone Creek in 1973. The bonebed has extreme signi cance because of its density of disarticulated skeletons. It contains up to 100 bones per square meter. 3500 bones, and over 20 skulls or partial skulls have been collected from the site.
