Paleontologists in North Carolina have unearthed a new dinosaur species that lived nearly 100 million years ago in what is now Utah. It’s a plant-eating dinosaur the size of a large dog that lived in burrows underground. It might just be the first dinosaur with a CHamoru name and a special connection to Guam.

Paleontologists have unearthed a new dinosaur species, a 7' long dinosaur, and it’s named after the CHamoru creation story, Pontan and Fo’na. "This new dinosaur is named Fona Herzogae. Fona is a really cool dinosaur because it's a small dinosaur, which is really uncommon to find. When we think of dinosaurs, we think of these giant behemoth creatures that were stomping around the Earth, but there were also a lot of smaller dinosaurs. They are just harder to find," explained paleontologist Haviv Avrahami, a PhD candidate at North Carolina State University and a digital technician for the Dueling Dinosaurs Project at the National Science Museum.

He’s the author of the new dinosaur species publication, whose discovery was years in the making.

"A lot of people think that when a new dinosaur is discovered it’s found one day and the next day and we announce it to the world. But there’s a lot of science that has to happen before we give a dinosaur a name," he said.

It took over 10 years for the initial discovery in the ground to see the light of publication. "The first specimen of Fona was found in 2013 by the Chicago Field Museum. Then our team of North Carolina paleontologists went out to the same area in Utah, working with them because it's a big collaborative effort, then we started finding another site in 2015, and then we found another one in 2017, and then we just keep finding them almost every other year now," he said.

But the reason why he named the new dinosaur Fona? He’s also the grandson of Joseph and Annie Villagomez from Barrigada. He stated, "I’m so proud of being CHamoru but somewhat disconnected from it because my family was part of the diaspora so we grew up in San Diego. I only got to visit Guam when my grandfather’s funeral back in 2019 right before the pandemic. And when I was there, I just became obsessed with everything CHamoru. It’s like I was coming back to something that I never knew I was missing."

Now he’s excited to honor his roots while doing his part to decolonize the science of fossils. "The sciences in general have a long dark history in colonial practices. Paleontology, and archaeology, also has a long history of colonial practices, colonial culture, and a very extractive mentality," he said.

It’s a legacy of paleontology Avrahami is hoping to change for the better. He says in the past centuries, this fossil science usually resulted in shipping off new discoveries to western museums and giving them european-based or latinized names.

"Indigenous people have not seen a lot of representation in a lot of these STEM fields– paleontology and archaeology. So going into it I knew I wanted to honor indigenous culture. I decided that since this is my first dinosaur, I wanted to start by honoring my own roots, and on my mother’s side, we’re CHamoru," he said.

He wanted to do it in the right way, so he began by making connections with local experts. He said, "I eventually got connected with a guy named Dietrix Jon Ulukoa Duhaylonsod. He connected me to a guy named Jeremy Cepeda. Both of them are cultural, historical and language experts for Guam and the pacific islands. We linked up to a guy named Raphael Unpingco and we all had a big zoom meeting to talk story."

It’s through these talks that he realized the creation story was a perfect fit. "Because there’s a lot of symbolism and connection there. So the whole story Fona being the sister and Puntan being the brother. And out of love and compassion, she uses pieces of his body to craft parts of the universe. Then she becomes part of the earth herself. So she fossilizes and from her body comes new forms of life," he said.

He feels it mirrors the life and death of Fona the Dinosaur, who also lived in close family bonds underground and returned back to the earth. As Avarahami reflects on his publication, he hopes it provides encouragement to others in his field.

"I hope it keeps people really excited about exploring new ways to integrate culture and science together. And I hope it inspires people to decolonize paleontology in creative ways, and not just with the way we name new dinosaurs but also with how we interact with the public and make connections," he said.

And most especially, he hopes his story inspires more kids in the Marianas and the Pacific Islands to follow in his footsteps, saying, "The world we live in today is only a single snapshot in the long history of what life is like on planet earth. Paleontology provides us the video reel of that single picture and fills in a lot of the gaps we have. And that’s a wonderful mystery adventure to be a part of. There are so many more discoveries out there that are just waiting to be found."