KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Kansas now has a state fossil.
Gov. Laura Kelly signed Senate Bill 3 on Friday, which designates Silvisaurus condrayi as the official state land fossil.
The Silvisaurus was “a one-ton armored ankylosaur approximately 13 feet long that walked across Kansas during the late cretaceous period of the Mesozoic era,” according to the new statute.
It is “the only known dinosaur from the Dakota Formation in Kansas,” the governor’s office said in a release.
The Silvisaurus, which is on display at the University of Kansas Biodiversity Institute and Natural History Museum in Lawrence, was a medium-sized, armored herbivore whose remains were discovered in 1955 by a rancher in Ottawa County in central Kansas.
“Designating this state fossil helps educators further demonstrate Kansas’ relevance to eras long before the founding of the United States,” Gov. Laura Kelly said.
Among five other mostly procedural bills Kelly signed Friday, Kansas counties may now create a code inspection and enforcement fund as well as a municipalities fight addiction fund, which will be used to distribute money from state opioid settlements.
The act, House Bill 2082, also allows equipment funds to be used for technology expenses.
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