Tiny Jawbone of a Rodent

I guess I should have included something in here to show the scale of this thing; it's less than an inch long, very thing and fragile. It's a miracle those teeth are still in there.

So here's the story: the University's Museum of Natural History held an open house today to show off its collection of butterflies and bones. There was an activity table at which one could dissect owl pellets, of which they seemed to have an unlimited supply. It's not owl poop as I had thought, but owl vomit, making it a little less gross. Maybe. It was mostly (all) kids at the table, happily pulling apart the compact ball of stuff the owl couldn't digest. There were bones in there! and teeth! Well, bones are so lovely that I had to give it a try. I got my own plastic baggie with a pellet about the size of a large thumb, and began pulling off the fur and whatever with tweezers and a tiny pick. I lucked out: there were two skulls in my pellet, the larger one was probably a rat, and this smaller one I'm not sure what. What a treasure hunt! I did have one nasty moment when I found a maggot inside the skull, and I had to ask the sweet little student on duty to please please please remove it right now please. My threshold had been mightily breached, but she had no problem doing a rescue. Here is the best part: we each got to take our bones home! It is interesting to think that my owl had ingested two rodents before he felt the need to disgorge. I mean, if you're interested in stuff like that...