If you’re in the market for prehistoric-themed lawn ornaments, an upcoming online auction may have just the thing.
Able Auctions is selling a dozen animatronic dinosaurs from a private collection in Lantzville.
One Tyrannosaurus rex is 11 metres or 37 feet long, said Brett Johnston, Vancouver Island manager for Able Auctions.
The dinosaurs, a dino-shaped waterslide, an electric train, a tree that sings songs in Russian, a food truck, tractors and more will be auctioned off May 25 starting at 9:30 a.m. A preview at the Clark Drive property that houses the collection runs from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on May 24.
One dinosaur has room for someone to climb inside and operate by viewing a video screen, Johnston said Tuesday. “It will roar and it will walk and you can chase people in it.”
Johnston, who was at the property Monday for a promotional video of the moving dinosaurs, has no idea how much they will sell for. Some of the dinosaurs were sold through Able Auctions in 2020. “We got tons of money for them,” he said.
The dinosaur collection is well known to local residents and motorists passing by the Lantzville property of Stan Pottie, of DJ Excavating.
Pottie could not be reached Tuesday, but previously said he could not resist buying the dinosaurs by auction and from China, spending a total of $380,000 for all 12.
His first two were a 4.5-metre-tall amargasaurus and a duckbill parasaurophus from the auction house.
The group includes a stegosaurus, a triceratops and two blue raptors that were in a Jurassic World movie with actor Chris Pratt, Pottie said. “They look and move like they are stealing eggs.”
The District of Lantzville, however, maintained Pottie’s dinosaur park was illegal since his land is zoned for residential use only.
In August 2021, the district won its case in B.C. Supreme Court.
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