Watch: St Bathans' Fossilised Fauna

For the past 17 years, researchers at Canterbury Museum, in collaboration with Flinders University in Australia, Te Papa Tongarewa The Museum of New Zealand and the University of New South Wales, have undertaken regular trips to fossil sites near St Bathans, Central Otago.

The fossilised animal remains found at these sites provide a rare insight into the New Zealand of 19 to 16 million years ago – a country with a climate comparable to Queensland, Australia, and fauna including crocodiles, turtles and giant burrowing bats.

In this talk to the Friends of Canterbury Museum Paul Scofield, Senior Curator Natural History, explains what we're learning about prehistoric New Zealand from the St Bathans fossils.