Hello and welcome to my latest edition to my paleontology blog. The focus this time is on some of the most famous and astounding discoveries in the world of paleontology. I have had a passion for this subject from a young age and really hope you enjoy the publication. As always thank you for reading and feel free to give feedback.
Giant by name giant by nature.
When Professor Ralph von Koenisgswald, wandered off the
streets of Hong Kong into a traditional Chinese apothercary shop in 1935, he
must surely have had no idea of the landmark discovery he was about to make.
The professor a much respected paleoanthropologist, became fascinated with one
particular fossil. This fossil on closer inspection, he identified as a tooth
specifically belonging to a primate but far bigger than anything he had seen before.
These teeth had been for more than a century, dug up and sold as “dragons teeth
“ to be used in Chinese medicine.
Von Koenisgswald, determined to unearth more specimens began
his own quest and over the course of several years, discovered three more
teeth. The creature these teeth belonged to he named gigantopithecus. Gigantopithecus translates as gigantic
ape and with good reason, standing up to three metres high and weighing in at
up to 540 kgs, this is the largest ape the world has ever seen.
Driven by the discovery and the thirst for more knowledge, Von
Koenisgswald planned to unearth more answers to questions such as where the
species had roamed and what supplemented such an enormous animal. Quite possibly
he would have found the answers to these questions himself had fate not
intervened with his enlisting to serve in World War 2. He would then become a
prisoner captured by the Japanese and later taken to Java. Throughout this his
specimens remained hidden in a milk bottle, buried in a friends garden on the
same island.
Further research has revealed a surprising amount given that
almost the entirety of the remains found over time are still teeth with a handful
of jawbones. Living in South east Asia, gigantopithecus, would likely have been
far too large to large to live its life in any other way than roaming the
forest floor. It has also been suggested that walking may have occurred on two
legs, thus saving the strain of carrying such a weight on the shoulders and wrists.
The canine teeth short and blunt ideal for grinding and molars flattened with a
layer of enamel, suitable for crushing food, support the idea the diet of this
giant ape was high in fibre and omnivorous. Gigantopithecus became extinct
approximately 200,000 years ago. Lack of food and the impact of early man are
thought to be potential contributing factors towards its demise.
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| Image credit : https://d1o50x50snmhul.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/dn24861-1_800.jpg |
A new world of predatory dinosaur.
The year of 1983 proved to be a
hugely significant one for revelations about predatory dinosaurs. This was
thanks to the hammer of William Walker an amateur fossil hunter exploring the
clay pits of Dorking, Surrey. His astounding find, a claw of 30 centimetres in
length was to announce the arrival of a new discovery to science. The claw belonged
to a huge predatory dinosaur later named baryonx. Over a period of three weeks,
two tonnes of rock were dug through to reveal what Angela Milner of the Natural
History Museum descried as “probably the most complete dinosaur that’s ever been
found in Britain”.
The finds revealed solid evidence
of a new world of carnivorous dinosaur. With a long slender snout resembling
that of a crocodile, and sharp, fluted pattern teeth, these seemed the
perfection adaptions for a life hunting fish. Further inspection of where the
stomach would have been confirmed beyond doubt those suspicions. Semi digested
fossilised fish scales showed that this enormous predator to be an aquatic based
hunter and opened up a whole new line of dinosaur discovery.
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The lethal claw of baryonx. Image credit:http://www.dinowight.org.uk/baryclaw.jpg
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Frozen in time.
A fossil discovered in the Gobi
desert in 1971 is arguably one of the most incredible fossils ever found. A
velociraptor and protoceratops forever frozen in a life and death struggle. Velociraptor slashing at the neck and belly of protaceratops who in return had
the raptors right arm firmly clamped in its beak. The most likely causes of the
abrupt end to the conflict would seen to be a sandstorm or the collapse of a
dune. Whatever the case, this incredible find has allowed scientists to gain invaluable
knowledge into attack and defence strategies of these incredible animals.
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| Forever locked in conflict. Image credit:http://dinotoyblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/FightVelo-pht-l.jpg |
Dinosaur graveyard.
Roughly 76 million years ago the
rains came and came hard over what would later become western Canada. While the
flooding was a problem which could be avoided for many animals capable of
flying or fleeing to pastures new or sanctuary in the tree tops, for a huge
herd of centrosaurus it proved a death trap. Unable to escape, many hundreds perished,
their remains encased in mud.
Their fate however has now been revealed
to the world of palaeontology, thanks to events twelve thousand years ago. A
glacier forced its way through rock, creating a valley which subsequently turned
the mud into mudstone. The south Saskatchewan River now flows through this
valley and while doing so erodes fossilised ones from its walls.
The bonebed named the Hilda mega-bonebed,
covers 0.9 of a mile and in 2010 after ten years of hard work, its secrets
where finally identified and revealed. To do this several sample areas were
excavated, with the number of fossils found in each counted and multiplied to
gain an understanding of how many remains rest forever ever in the inaccessible
rock stratrum. The estimation of 667 centrosaurs provided proof that herds of
this species of ceratopsian and quite possibly other ceratopsians were of far
greater size than previously known potentially even going to a thousand or more
in number.
Dino droppings.
Amusing as it may sound fossilised
faeces known as coprolites are very valuate to scientists and an incredibly
rare find. Coprolites not only allow scientists to gain an understanding of an
animals diet they can also in the case of plant matter being discovered improve
knowledge of plant evolution. This can occur if the remains of a plant are
represented in a find millions of years earlier than its existence was
previously known. The largest coprolite so far discovered is 17 centimetres in
length and 6 inches across. The content comprising of bone chips leaves
scientists to speculate this came from a tyrannosaurus rex.
Deinonychus the predator the
infamous exaggerated velociraptors in the Jurassic Park franchise are based on
has left not just skeletal evidence of its existence behind. Trackways have
revealed whilst running their dreaded claws one on each foot were held aloft
ready to strike downwards on a victim. With these claws measuring five inches
in length it is unsurprising that the name deinonychus means terrible claw.
Evidence has also emerged that these
predators hunted in packs. Trackways have been found seemingly showing these
dromaeosaurs running together, and fossilised teeth found in the remains of
tenontosaurus. An ornithopod, tenontosaurus was more than twice the length of deinonychus
and so it further fuels the speculation it may have taken more than one
individual to bring about its demise.
Dinosaur nesting.
Maiasaura was a hadrosaur which
lived in Montana during the late Cretaceous. The name maiasaura means good
mother lizard and with good reason. During the 1970’s, a nesting site was
discovered which would provide a remarkable insight into hadrosaur family life.
The nests were two metres across and formed from low mud. The distance between
nests was fractionally longer than the length of the adult hadrosaurs to
prevent conflict while resting on the eggs.
The eggs themselves were
positioned in a hollow on top of the mound while vegetation was placed on top
of them. This acted like a compost heap producing warmth whilst it rotted. Nest
remains were situated in successive rock layers, suggesting that these nesting
grounds were revisited on a yearly basis. Ones from a variety of age ranges
were discovered and imply not only did hatchlings live in the nest for a long
period of time, they were also cared for until they had become well grown. Despite
the best efforts of the parents however, remains of egg eating lizards and nest
infecting beetles provide evidence of the threats they still faced and it seems
inevitable the raids on the nest were sometimes successful.
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| Image credit :http://nature.nps.gov/geology/nationalfossilday/images/2014_artwork/11_Maisaura.jpg |
The first bird.
It is 1861 and workers in a
limestone quarry in Germany are just about to make an incredible discovery. A fossilised
feather, the first one in history. Shortly afterwards almost the full remains
of the animal were discovered. It was roughly the size of a magpie and its name
given to it by German palaeontologist Hermann von Meyer meant “the ancient wing”.
There can be no doubt; the discovery of archaeopteryx is surely one of the biggest
in the palaeontology world.
Archaeopteryx in text books is
classed as the first bird, however it is described as being the perfection
illustration of transitional form between birds and dinosaurs. The bird
features archaeopteryx possess are the covering of feathers and wing structure similar
to those of modern day birds. Dinosaur features include tooth filled jaws and a
long stiff tail. Such are the nature of these mix of features, that if the
first specimen had been found without feathers, this remarkable animal would
have been classed as a dinosaur rather than a bird.
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| Image credit :http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/diapsids/birds/archie2.jpg |
The misrepresentations of
Iguanodon.
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| Crystal Palace Gardens. Image credit : http://www.newsshopper.co.uk/resources/images/4468548/ |
Iguanodon was only the second
dinosaur to be discovered and quite possibly no other animal has been subject to
so morphological misunderstanding.
The story of iguanodon began in
the west Sussex village of Cuckfield in 1822. Gideon Mantell discovered
fossilised teeth unlike those of which had been found previously. The teeth
appeared to be those belonging to a herbivorous, land based animal. This
assumption was initially met with heavy doubt from William Buckland and Georges
Cuvier, an English geologist and French naturalist and zoologist respectively. They
put the findings down to most likely belonging to an extinct species of rhino. Only
after Buckland descried the remains of megalosaurus, the first meat eating
dinosaur to be identified two years later, did he admit the teeth were
reptilian but he countered most likely not herbivorous. Mantell energised by
this new development, sent the teeth to Cuvier who then agreed they most likely
belonging to a herbivorous reptilian. Mantel after being made aware of the similarities
of the teeth to those of modern iguanas, decided to name his find iguanodon,
meaning iguana –tooth.
The teeth alone were not enough to
base what the animal may have looked like however, speculation really began
when more complete remains where unearthed in Kent. Mantel made mistakes with
his observations however, he portrayed iguanodon as predominantly moving on all
fours, a long tail trailing behind on the ground and placed a horn on its nose.
He did though get correctly showed the front legs being shorter than the hind
legs and still portrayed a more accurate image than rival palaeontologist Richard
Owen. Owen, a creationist against the theory of evolution, believed dinosaurs
were not ancestors of modern day reptiles and instead were advanced mammal like
creatures which had succumbed to extinction. He portrayed iguanodon as similar to
rhinos and elephants and his ideas of them as squat quadrupeds were portrayed
in Crystal Palace Park.
Owens portrayal was disposed of in
1878 when 38 iguanodon specimens were discovered in in a coalmine situated in Bernissart
Belgium. This remains the largest discovery of iguanodon in history. Reconstructions
were created under the guidance of Belgian palaeontologist Louis Dollo. He believed
and showed iguanodon to have a posture similar to those of a wallaby or
kangaroo standing on hind legs and using their tails for balance. The end in
the tail has after further research been shown to be incorrect with the tail remaining
straight thanks to one like tendons. He did correctly position the previously assumed
horn, as a thumb spike. The role of spike is debated some feel it was used as antipredator
strategy, while others believe it may have been used to break open hard shelled
fruits.
Twentieth century research has
shown that contrary to earlier beliefs, iguanodon held its whole body horizontally
to the ground. It could walk on all fours or bipedally. It is suggested that
age was a factor in how the individual largely moved presumably the older and
heavier it became the more time was spent on all fours. Younger animals however
may have spent the majority of their time walking upright.
Iguanodon was one of the first identified
dinosaurs in history and surely one of the most misunderstood. It has taken 194
years for most of its secrets to be revealed and surely this in itself is the
perfect illustration of how much we still have to learn about the mind blowing
world of palaeontology. I hope you enjoy the log I really appreciate you
reading and feel free to have a look at my Facebook page.
All the best,
George.
Dinosaurs the grand tour, Keiron Pim.
Natural History Museum Alive, Amabel Adcock.
The complete illustrated encyclopedia of dinosaurs and prehistoric creatures, Dougal Dixon.
Dinosaurs rediscovered, Science Uncovered.
