Can you dig it? What to do if you find a Stegamastodon

These are the steps to follow if you make a museum-worthy discovery - like the nine-year old who uncovered a 1.2m-year-old animal skull in New Mexico

When so many relics are stumbled on by accident, it is a wonder that specialists still bother digging around in books, rather than just going for a wander. Indeed, New Mexico State University recently revealed that it received a call last year from the parents of nine-year-old Jude Sparks, who had literally stumbled over a 1.2m-year-old fossil. Sparks was out walking with his family in Las Cruces, New Mexico, when he tripped over something jutting out from the earth. He thought it was the skull of a "big fat rotten cow", but biologist Prof Peter Haude determined that it belonged to a Stegomastodon - a distant relative of the elephant, and similar to a mastodon. The university estimates that the process to study and reconstruct the skull, jaw and tusks will take several years to complete.

If Jude's story has inspired you, you might want to follow these tips provided to the Guardian by Prof Paul Barrett, president of the Palaeontographical Society and a researcher at the Natural History Museum. "Finding fossils is a mixture of pure chance and careful planning," says Barrett. "It takes a keen eye and lots of looking at the ground to see those that erosion has started to uncover."