Amazing Armoured Dinosaur Zuul Goes on Display

The ankylosaurid named Zuul (Z. crurivastator), is the centrepiece of a new exhibition that opened this week at the Royal Ontario Museum, (Canada).  The exhibition is entitled “ZUUL: Life of an Armoured Dinosaur” and it tells the tale of how this beautifully-preserved dinosaur fossil was discovered and what it can tell us about life in the Late Cretaceous some 76 million years ago.

Zuul – Destroyer of Shins

Picture credit: Royal Ontario Museum

Commenting on this new addition to the Museum’s galleries, Royal Ontario Museum Director and CEO Josh Basseches stated:

“We are thrilled to be introducing Toronto and the world to an extraordinary new dinosaur.  The acquisition of Zuul represents a significant new addition to our globally renowned collection of dinosaurs and fauna.  With the generous support of presenting sponsor Sinking Ship Entertainment, and our team of renowned palaeontologists and exhibition developers, we look forward to presenting a truly unique exhibition that will inspire and delight visitors of all ages.”

Cutting Edge Technology to Showcase Ancient Armoured Giant

The exhibition uses a combination of engaging video games, digital images and animations along with full-sized murals that recreates northern Montana/southern Alberta during the Campanian faunal stage of the Late Cretaceous.

This is the first time that the fossilised remains of Zuul have been put on display anywhere in the world.  Touchscreens will let visitors rotate 3-D views of Zuul’s original fossil pieces, while life-size touchable bronze models of Zuul’s skull, armour, skin, and tail club will permit visitors to feel what it would have been like to touch the living dinosaur.  An animal named after a monster from the 1984 film “Ghostbusters”, Zuul was named in honour of the horned, demi-god Zuul, the Gatekeeper of Gozer from the movie.

A Replica of the Zuul Fossil Material Being Attacked by a Gorgosaurus

Picture credit: Royal Ontario Museum

Dr David Evans, the exhibition’s lead curator and one of the palaeontologists that formally named and described this ankylosaur, commented:

“In this multi-faceted exhibition, visitors will see the breath-taking Zuul fossil up close and through a treasure trove of incredible fossils found alongside the skeleton, learn more about Zuul’s diverse ancient world.  Zuul: Life of an Armoured Dinosaur will spark curiosity about our distant past and the evolution of life over time.”

To read Everything Dinosaur’s article on the discovery of this remarkably complete (95% of the skeleton has been preserved), armoured dinosaur: Zuul – The Destroyer of Shins.

The Beautiful and Fantastically-well Preserved Skull of Zuul crurivastator will be on Display as Part of the Exhibit

Picture credit: Royal Ontario Museum

Safari Ltd recently introduced a model of this armoured dinosaur.

To view the Safari Ltd range: Wild Safari Prehistoric World Models.

From the Judith River Formation of Montana

Heralding from the famous Judith River Formation, Zuul crurivastator is one of the most complete ankylosaur fossils ever found.  It has a complete skull and tail club as well as preserved skin and other soft tissues that will provide a rare and exciting opportunity for new, cutting-edge scientific research.  Zuul was acquired by the ROM in 2016 through the generous support of the Louise Hawley Stone Charitable Trust.

Everything Dinosaur acknowledges the assistance of a press release from the Royal Ontario Museum in the compilation of this article.

Visit the Everything Dinosaur website: Everything Dinosaur.

Study Finds Four Types of Feather-like Structures in Pterosaur Fossils

Most palaeontologists have accepted that it is likely that pterosaurs (flying reptiles), were covered in a sort of hairy fuzz, technically referred to as pycnofibres, that helped insulate their bodies and keep them warm.  However, an international team of scientists from Hong Kong University, Nanjing University (China), University College Cork, University College Dublin (Ireland), the Foundation for Scientific Advancement, (Arizona, USA), the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Bristol University (UK) have published a scientific paper that describes four kinds of feather-like structures associated with the fossilised remains pterosaurs.

If these structures are feathers, then this suggests that either the Pterosauria evolved feathers as a form of convergent evolution, or, that feathers evolved many millions of years earlier than previously thought – in a common ancestor of the Dinosauria and the Pterosauria.

A Life Reconstruction of the Chinese Anurognathid Pterosaur

Picture credit: Yuan Zhang

Two Anurognathid Pterosaur Specimens Studied

Writing in the academic journal “Nature Ecology and Evolution”, the scientists report how high-resolution microscopy revealed evidence of different kinds of pycnofibres on two pterosaur fossils  (representing anurognathids), from the Daohugou Formation in Inner Mongolia.  Although, when the rocks that make up the Daohugou Formation were deposited has been debated and the relative dating of these sediments in relation to other Chinese Jurassic/Early Cretaceous formations has proved controversial, it is suggested that the pterosaurs, one of which represents a new species, lived approximately 160 million years ago.

Four feather-like structures were identified:

• simple filaments (hairs)
• bundles of filaments
• filaments with a tuft halfway down the shaft
• down feathers

The Scientists Identified Four Types of Feather-like Structures in the Fossils

Picture credit: Yang, Jiang, McNamara et al

An Amazing Pterosaur Discovery

One of the paper’s authors, Dr Maria McNamara (University College Cork), stated that some critics have suggested that there is only one simple hair-like type of pycnofibre, but this study shows different structures that we also see in dinosaurs, in essence real feathers.  Furthermore, the team identified melanosomes that indicate that some flying reptiles may have been coloured a sort of reddish brown.

Dr McNamara explained:

“We focused on areas where the feathers did not overlap and where we could see their structure more clearly.  They even show fine details of pigment granules, which may have given the fluffy feathers a ginger colour.  This discovery has amazing implications for our understanding of the origin of feathers, but also for a major time of revolution of life on land.  When feathers arose, about 250 million years ago, life was recovering from the devastating end-Permian mass extinction.”

The Enigmatic Anurognathidae

Only a handful of anurognathid fossils are known and only a few species have been assigned to this pterosaur family.  Although, the first anurognathids were described from Upper Jurassic deposits of Bavaria (Solnhofen limestone), the best preserved and most complete specimens came from the Daohugou Beds of Inner Mongolia.  Since these types of small, short-faced flying reptiles are known from Europe, South Korea, China and potentially North America, they seem to have been geographically widespread.  Although very rare, the Daohugou Bed fossil specimens have some soft tissue and muscle outline preservation and have provided palaeontologists with a lot of information on pterosaur anatomy.

An Anurognathid Pterosaur from the Daohugou Beds – Jeholopterus ninchengensis 

Picture credit: Chinese Academy of Sciences/Journal of Vertebrate Palaeontology

Re-writing the History of the Evolution of Feathers

Feathers are essentially highly modified scales; this new research could potentially re-write the evolutionary history of feathers.  One of the authors, Professor Mike Benton (Bristol University), explained:

“We ran some evolutionary analyses and they showed clearly that the pterosaur pycnofibres are feathers, just like those seen in modern birds and across various dinosaur groups.  Despite careful searching, we couldn’t find any anatomical evidence that the four pycnofibre types are in any way different from the feathers of birds and dinosaurs.  Therefore, because they are the same, they must share an evolutionary origin, and that was about 250 million years ago, long before the origin of birds.”

Birds have two types of advanced feathers used in flight and for body smoothing, the contour feathers with a hollow quill and barbs down both sides.  These types of feathers are found only in birds and the theropod dinosaurs close to the evolutionary origins of the Aves (birds).  However, the other feather types of modern birds include monofilaments and down feathers, and these are seen much more widely across dinosaurs and pterosaurs.

Growth Suppressed

The armoured dinosaurs and the giant sauropods probably did not have feathers, but they were likely suppressed, meaning they were prevented from growing, at least in the adults, just as hair is suppressed in large-bodied animals today such as cetaceans, hippos and elephants.

High Resolution Microscopy Revealed Different Types of Feather-like Structures

Picture credit: Yang, Jiang, McNamara et al

Professor Benton added:

“This discovery has amazing implications for our understanding of the origin of feathers, but also for a major time of revolution of life on land.  When feathers arose, about 250 million years ago, life was recovering from the devasting end-Permian mass extinction.  Independent evidence shows that land vertebrates, including the ancestors of mammals and dinosaurs, had switched gait from sprawling to upright, had acquired different degrees of warm-bloodedness, and were generally living life at a faster pace.” 

He went on:

“The mammal ancestors by then had hair, so likely the pterosaurs, dinosaurs and relatives had also acquired feathers to help insulate them.  The hunt for feathers in fossils is heating up and finding their functions in such early forms is imperative.  It can rewrite our understanding of a major revolution in life on Earth during the Triassic, and also our understanding of the genomic regulation of feathers, scales, and hairs in the skin.”

Different Kinds of Pycnofibres – Different Functions?

Pterosaurs were the first back-boned animals to evolve powered flight.  However, following their extinction at the end of the Cretaceous, they left no living close relatives, nor indeed any near related analogues for scientists to study.  Whilst the presence of pycnofibres on the bodies of these flying reptiles is quite well accepted by the scientific community, their functions are not fully understood.  If different types of feather-like structures have been identified in two anurognathid pterosaur specimens, it is likely that other types of pterosaur had them too.

These different feather-like structures probably served a variety of functions, perhaps the first “pterosaur fuzz” evolved to provide insulation and then other types evolved perhaps to aid tactile sensing, visual communication and to assist with flight.

The scientific paper: “Pterosaur Integumentary Structures with Complex Feather-like Branching” by Z. Yang, B. Jiang, M. McNamara, S. Kearns, M. Pittman, T. Kaye, P. Orr, X. Xu and M. Benton and published in Nature Ecology and Evolution.

Everything Dinosaur acknowledges the assistance of a press release from Bristol University in the compilation of this article.

Visit the Everything Dinosaur website: Everything Dinosaur.

Crittendenceratops krzyzanowskii – A New Horned Dinosaur from Arizona

Many scientists and observers have described the last two decades as the “Golden Age” of dinosaur discoveries.  Since the turn of the century, there have been some astonishing fossil finds and many new species of dinosaur have been discovered and described.  None more so than with the horned dinosaurs and their relatives (Marginocephalia).

Over the last few years, we have reported on numerous new types of ceratopsian, many of these new horned dinosaurs having been discovered in strata laid down in the United States, for example, Medusaceratops, Aquilops, Kosmoceratops and Utahceratops.  Surprisingly, there had been no new horned dinosaurs named in 2018, that is no longer the case with a scientific paper published describing a new centrosaurine dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous of Arizona – Crittendenceratops krzyzanowskii.

A Life Reconstruction of the Newly Described Ceratopsian Crittendenceratops krzyzanowskii

Picture credit: Sergey Krasovskiy

Only a Few Dinosaurs Named from Arizona

Writing in the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin, the researchers, Sebastian G. Dalman and Asher Lichtig, both Research Associates at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science, in collaboration with John-Paul Hodnett from the Maryland-National Capital Parks Commission and Spencer G. Lucas (a curator at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science), describe Crittendenceratops and assign it the Centrosaurinae subfamily of horned dinosaurs and specifically to the Nasutoceratopsini tribe.

There have been so many new horned dinosaurs from North America named and described in the last twenty years or so, that this has led to a revision of ceratopsian taxonomy.  For example, the Nasutoceratopsini was erected recently (2016).

To read an article that summarises this revision: Redefining the Horned Dinosaurs.

Despite the wealth of dinosaur fossil material associated with the western United States, Crittendenceratops is one of only a handful of dinosaurs named from Arizona.

A Reconstruction of the Parietosquamosal Frill of C. krzyzanowskii

Picture credit: New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science

Crittendenceratops krzyzanowskii from the Fort Crittenden Formation

This new herbivore has been described from fragmentary fossil material, including skull elements from the shale member of the Fort Crittenden Formation.  Two individual animals are represented by the fossils.  Crittendenceratops is estimated to have been around 3.5 metres in length and would have weighed about 750 kilograms.  It lived 73 million years ago (Campanian stage of the Cretaceous) and the rocks that yielded the bones were deposited along the margins of a large lake that was present in an area southeast of Tucson, Arizona.

The Nearly Complete Left Squamosal (Skull Bone) of Crittendenceratops

Picture credit: New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science

Honouring Stan Krzyzanowski

The new species was named by Sebastian G. Dalman, John-Paul Hodnett, Asher Lichtig and Spencer G. Lucas.  The genus name reflects the rock formation where the fossils were found (Fort Crittenden Formation), whereas the trivial name honours the late Stan Krzyzanowski, a Research Associate from the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science, who discovered the first bones to be ascribed to this new dinosaur in the Adobe Canyon area eighteen years ago.  Crittendenceratops can be distinguished from other members of the Centrosaurinae subfamily by the unique shape of the bones in its frill.

The scientific paper: “A New Ceratopsid Dinosaur (Centrosaurinae Nasutoceratopsini) from the Fort Crittenden Formation Upper Cretaceous (Campanian) of Arizona” by Spencer G. Lucas, Sebastian Dalman, Asher Lichtig and John-Paul Michael Hodnett published in the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin.

Everything Dinosaur acknowledges the assistance of a press release from the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science in the compilation of this article.

Visit the award-winning Everything Dinosaur website: Everything Dinosaur.

Fossil Sea Urchin Preserves Evidence of an Attack from a Mosasaur

Sixty-six million years ago, in a shallow sea in what is now Denmark, a sea urchin lay partially submerged on the seabed, when a keen-eyed mosasaur spotted it and went in for the kill.  The marine reptile grabbed the sea urchin and bit it, but for some reason, the attack was aborted, the invertebrate was dropped and the little sea urchin survived the encounter with the apex predator.  How do we know all this?  A remarkable fossil has been discovered by amateur geologist Peter Bennicke at Stevns Klint, a famous UNESCO World Heritage Site, one of the few places in the world where rock layers mark the Cretaceous-Palaeogene boundary providing evidence to support the extra-terrestrial impact event that contributed to the demise of the Dinosauria.

Fossil Provides Evidence of a Mosasaur Attack

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Preserving Evidence of Predator/Prey Interactions

The stretch of chalk cliffs at Stevns Klint on the Danish island of Zealand (Sjaelland), was granted World Heritage Site status by UNESCO in 2014.  The chalk deposits record the K/T boundary and the cliffs provide a record of the faunal turnover from the very end of the Cretaceous (Maastrichtian faunal stage), through to the earliest stage of the Palaeogene Period (Danian faunal stage).  Sea urchin fossils are relatively common at this location, but the specimen found by Mr Bennicke is very special as it records evidence of predator/prey interaction.

The curator at the nearby Geomuseum Faxe, Jesper Milàn stated:

“It’s really an exciting find this, not only is there an exciting story to tell about it, but it also provides important information about how the animals in the Cretaceous sea lived and who ate who.  It is such a find that helps put meat and blood on the otherwise dry fossils, when you can suddenly see such a small everyday drama caught in the stone.”

The Echinocorys Specimen Showing Evidence of a Mosasaur Attack

Picture credit: Jesper Milàn

What Type of Mosasaur Attacked the Sea Urchin?

The round tooth marks are located near the top of the Echinocorys specimen, suggesting that the attack came from above and it is likely that the sea urchin was partially exposed out of the sediment on the sea floor when the attack occurred.  An examination of the morphology of the tooth marks and their spacing indicates that the attacker had slender teeth, that were circular in cross-section and that these teeth were spaced relatively far apart in the jaw.  Two types of hypercarnivorous mosasaurids are known from Denmark – Mosasaurus hoffmanni and Plioplatecarpus spp.  It could be speculated that one of these types of mosasaur was responsible for the attack.

A Mosasaurid Specimen is Used to Demonstrate the Sea Urchin Attack

Picture credit: TV OST

Lucky Escape for the Sea Urchin

Although a mosasaurid grabbed the sea urchin, it apparently abandoned the attack.  Hypercarnivores such as M. hoffmanni and Plioplatecarpus probably preyed on a variety of vertebrates and invertebrates, but their teeth are not really suited to crushing the shell of an Echinocorys.  Recently, Jesper Milàn in collaboration with other scientists, reported the discovery of a single broken tooth of a mosasaur called Carinodens minalmamar.  The tooth crown was found in the uppermost Maastrichtian chalk strata at Stevns Klint,  indicating that this mosasaur probably lived around 50,000 years before the deposition of the iridium rich K/Pg boundary material.  The shed tooth is reported to have come from the 11th or 13th position in the jaw.  The tooth represents the northernmost occurrence of the genus Carinodens found to date.  Carinodens minalmamar, was a very different type of predator compared to Mosasaurus hoffmanni and Plioplatecarpus, it was a specialist shell-eater (durophagus).  The short, thick and rounded teeth  of this type of mosasaur would have made quick work of the test of an Echinocorys.

Examples of the Teeth of Carinodens spp.

Picture credit: Holwerda and Jagt

The sea urchin may count itself fortunate to have been attacked by a mosasaur more used to catching fish, sea birds and other marine reptiles.  If a mosasaur such as Carinodens had grabbed the Echinocorys, then it is likely that the sea urchin would not have survived.

An exhibit telling the story of the sea urchin and who tried to eat it will open at the Geomuseum Faxe in February 2019.

To read an article about Stevns Klint being granted UNESCO World Heritage Site status: Famous KT Boundary gets UNESCO World Heritage Site Status.

For models and replicas of mosasaurs and other prehistoric marine reptiles: PNSO Age of Dinosaurs Figures.

Soft-tissue Evidence for Warm-blooded Ichthyosaurs

The fossilised remains of a beautifully-preserved ichthyosaur fossil from the Lower Cretaceous of Germany has revealed that “fish lizards” had blubber just like many modern, mammalian marine animals.  In addition, the fossil is so well-preserved that some of the soft-tissue associated with the specimen have retained some of their original pliability.  The fossil is an example of Stenopterygius, (MH 432; Urweltmuseum Hauff, Holzmaden, Germany) and it demonstrates aspects of convergent evolution showing how ichthyosaurs adapted to a marine environment in remarkably similar ways to what is seen in modern cetaceans.

Specimen Number MH 432 – The Partial Skeleton of a Stenopterygius Ichthyosaur with an Accompanying Line Drawing

Picture credit: Johan Lindgren

The marine reptile lived in what is southern Germany today, during the Jurassic Period approximately 180 million years ago.  At that time, the reptile, which was probably around two to three metres in length, swam in a vast, shallow ocean that was then covering large parts of present-day Europe.

Johan Lindgren, a senior lecturer in the Department of Geology (Lund University, Sweden), led the international collaboration that resulted in the most comprehensive and in-depth examination of a soft-tissue fossil ever undertaken.  Among other things, the study revealed that the soft parts had fossilised so rapidly that both the original cells and their internal contents were preserved.

The international research team identified blubber under the smooth skin that lacked scales.  Traces of internal organs were also analysed.

Dr Lindgren observed:

“You can clearly see both the body outline and remains of internal organs.  We can even distinguish the different cellular layers within the skin.”

Finding Evidence of Blubber Under the Skin

The researchers identified blubber underneath the skin.  To date, such specialised fat-laden tissue has only been found in modern marine mammals and adult individuals of the Leatherback sea turtle (Dermochelyidae coriacea).  The discovery of blubber suggests that ichthyosaurs had metabolic rates that were higher than those of typical extant reptiles.  It suggests a degree of homeothermy in the Ichthyosauria.  In essence, these reptiles were able to sustain an internal body temperature regardless of how cold the water was they were swimming in.

The results from this study could help to explain why the Ichthyosauria had such a large geographical range during the Mesozoic.  These creatures, that first evolved in the Triassic and died out some 80 million years ago, had an almost global distribution, even in cold waters.  Their layer of blubber would have helped them to dive very deep, perhaps diving to the deepest parts of the Epipelagic zone of the ocean or even into the Mesopelagic zone (diving down more than 220 metres).

Comparing Pressure and Heat Treated Porpoise Blubber to Ichthyosaur Fossil Blubber

Picture credit: Johan Lindgren and Martin Jarenmark

The team of international scientists also examined remains of the animal’s liver, which included part of the original biochemistry (eumelanin pigment and haemoglobin residues).

Dr Lindgren stated:

“It’s truly remarkable that the biomolecules we discovered so closely match the tissues that we could identify.”

In the study, the researchers also succeeded in showing that the fossil contains tissues that still retain some of their original pliability, even though 180 million years have passed since the animal died and sank to the bottom of the sea.  The team used chemicals to remove the mineral phase of the specimen, the inorganics that once turned the animal carcass into a petrified fossil.  Subsequent tests revealed that the soft tissues still retained a degree of elasticity.

Ichthyosaurs Had Counter Shading

A study of the melanophores and their distribution across the body indicates that ichthyosaurs possessed countershading.  They were darker on top, but lighter underneath.  The upper part of the body was dark, this may have helped the animal to warm up rapidly at the surface after a deep dive.  The dark colouration would absorb more energy from the sun.  In addition, the dark upper part of the body would provide a degree of UV protection and the countershading would have provided effective camouflage.  Many, living large pelagic (actively swimming), animals exhibit countershading.

A Model of an Ichthyosaur Showing Countershading

The model (above) is from the Safari Ltd range of figures.

To view this range of models: Wild Safari Prehistoric World Models.

Identifying Pigment Cells (Melanophores) in Fossil Material

Picture credit: Mats E. Eriksson, Federica Marone and Ola Gustafsson

Improving our Knowledge of Taphonomy

The research team conclude that this fossil has provided some remarkable insights into ichthyosaur anatomy and biology.  The study also reveals how much more we have to learn about the process of fossilisation (taphonomy).  The beautifully-preserved Stenopterygius fossil demonstrates a number of adaptations that ichthyosaurs share with other, living marine creatures such as the Leatherback turtle and toothed whales such as dolphins and porpoises.  Ever since the first outlines of preserved soft tissue were recognised in ichthyosaurs, scientists have commented on their superficial resemblance to modern cetaceans.  Thanks to this new study, it seems that this resemblance goes a lot further than was previously thought.

A Close-up View of Fossilised Skin (Stenopterygius)

Picture credit: Johan Lindgren

The scientific paper: “Soft-tissue Evidence for Homeothermy and Crypsis in a Jurassic Ichthyosaur” by Johan Lindgren, Peter Sjövall, Volker Thiel, Wenxia Zheng, Shosuke Ito, Kazumasa Wakamatsu, Rolf Hauff, Benjamin P. Kear, Anders Engdahl, Carl Alwmark, Mats E. Eriksson, Martin Jarenmark, Sven Sachs, Per E. Ahlberg, Federica Marone, Takeo Kuriyama, Ola Gustafsson, Per Malmberg, Aurélien Thomen, Irene Rodríguez-Meizoso, Per Uvdal, Makoto Ojika and Mary H. Schweitzer.  The paper is published in the journal Nature.

Everything Dinosaur acknowledges the assistance of a press release from Lund University in the compilation of this article.

Visit the Everything Dinosaur website: Everything Dinosaur.

Weewarrasaurus pobeni – Hints at Different Kinds of Dinosaur Communities

The fortuitous discovery of pieces from the lower jaw of a small, plant-eating dinosaur is helping scientists to discover more about the Cretaceous dinosaurs that once roamed Australia.  Writing in the academic journal “PeerJ”, the researchers provide evidence to support the idea that there were numerous small-bodied ornithopods at high latitudes in south-eastern Australia, whilst further north, in what would have been slightly warmer environments, these types of dinosaurs co-existed with much bigger ornithopods and titanosaurs.

The dinosaur has been named Weewarrasaurus pobeni (pronounced wee-whah-rar-sore-us poe-ben-eye) and it is the first new dinosaur to be described from New South Wales for nearly 100 years.

A Life Reconstruction of the Newly Described Gondwanan Ornithopod Weewarrasaurus pobeni

Picture credit: James Kuether

A Lucky Fossil Find

Adelaide-based opal buyer Mike Poben spotted the fossil pieces in a bucket of opal rubble from the Wee Warra opal field at Lightning Ridge (New South Wales, Australia).  The dinosaur was named in honour of the location and the trivial name recognises the contribution of Mr Poben who donated the specimens for research.

Numerous opalised dinosaur fossils are known from the Lightning Ridge area.  The material, including fragments of bones and isolated teeth come from the Griman Creek Formation.  Recent radiometric dating indicates that these deposits are around 100 to 96 million years old (Cenomanian stage of the Late Cretaceous), making these rocks some 10 million years younger than equivalent exposures containing dinosaur fossils found in northern Queensland.

The Fossil Jaw Fragments (Right Dentary) of Weewarrasaurus pobeni

Picture credit: PeerJ

Unfortunately, the underground mining process involves breaking up the rocks, so any specimens found tend to consist of isolated broken pieces, however the presence of a scalloped-shaped tooth in the object immediately caught the attention of Mr Poben, so he was able to quickly appreciate that this was part of a jawbone.  Lightning Ridge is the only place in the world where dinosaur bones and teeth routinely turn to opal.  Corresponding author of the scientific paper, Dr Philip Bell (University of New England), explained that researchers were now looking into acquiring more fossil material from opal mines.

Dr Bell stated:

“Unfortunately, the fossil remnants we see are almost always part of mining spoil… but on another hand, we would never get to see even those fragments if it wasn’t for mining.”

Opal Helps to Identify a Dinosaur

One of the benefits of the presence of opal in the fossil is that the distinctive banding pattern formed helped the scientists to identify that the two fossil pieces belonged to the same jawbone.

Views of the Jawbone Fossil (Weewarrasaurus pobeni)

Picture credit: PeerJ/Dr Bell (University of New England)

The picture above shows three views of the fossils, (A), medial; (B), dorsal; and (C) lateral views.   The dashed black line shows the outline of the missing pieces that would have comprised a more substantial part of the dentary.  The dashed red lines indicate the distinctive banding pattern in the opal used to estimate the extent of the missing area.  Another jawbone fragment (LRF 766), representing a right dentary with teeth in situ from the nearby Three Mile opal field has also been assigned to this new dinosaur species.

Faunal Differences in Different Regions of Prehistoric Australia

The Griman Creek Formation fossils from Lightning Ridge indicate that there were numerous small Ornithopods living in this environment during the Cenomanian stage of the Late Cretaceous.  This research provides further evidence to support previous studies that favour a general abundance of small-bodied basal Ornithopods in high-latitude localities of south-eastern Australia.  These little dinosaurs, most of which were under two metres in length, inhabited a verdant flood plain, but this part of the Gondwana was at approximately 60 degrees south.  Today, Australia is much further north, the city of Sydney (New South Wales), is located at approximately 33.86 degrees south.  During the Cretaceous, the dinosaurs that inhabited the part of Australia we now call New South Wales, would have had to endure periods of darkness in the year when the sun dipped below the horizon, although the presence of ectothermic reptiles such as crocodyliforms and turtles indicate that average minimum temperatures may not have fallen below 5 degrees Celsius.

Even so, the climate may have been too extreme for sauropods.  Cretaceous deposits in Queensland (Winton Formation), have revealed several titanosaurs, but the colder temperatures experienced further south may have limited sauropod distribution.

The researchers conclude that although future dinosaur fossil discoveries have the potential to alter these interpretations, it is suggested that the Griman Creek Formation at Lightning Ridge occupied a “meeting point” between more northern sauropod-dominated faunas and the ornithopod-dominated faunas that existed further south.

Computer Generated Images from Fossil Scans Helped to Identify Ornithopod Characteristics

Picture credit: PeerJ

To read a recent article about an opalised dinosaur toe bone found in South Australia: Lost Dinosaur Toe Bone Turns Up on the Internet.

Visit the award-winning Everything Dinosaur website: Everything Dinosaur.

Toe Bone Turns Up on the Internet

A rare dinosaur bone, one of only three dinosaur fossils known from the state of South Australia, is going on display at the South Australian Museum some forty-five years after it was lost to science.  The opalised bone, representing a single toe bone (phalanx), is believed to come from a type of theropod dinosaur and although named Kakuru kujani, which was officially described from opalised remains representing lower leg bones back in 1980, very little is known about this Cretaceous dinosaur.

The toe bone was found in Andamooka in the far north of South Australia sometime in the early 1970s.  It was spotted for sale in an opal shop in Hindley Street, Adelaide by Neville Pledge, the South Australian Museum’s then curator of fossils, in 1973.  Neville had the foresight to take several photographs, measurements and plaster casts of the toe bone.  However, shortly afterwards, the item was sold and it disappeared from the scientific community.

The Opalised Toe Bone on Display at the South Australian Museum

Picture credit: Ashleigh Glynn

The Tale of a Dinosaur Toe Bone

In April 2018, the bone was spotted up for sale on the internet by Coober Pedy resident Joy Kloester, who purchased the bone and then offered it to the South Australian Museum.  The Museum’s Senior Collections Manager for Earth Sciences, Ben McHenry acted quickly to acquire the specimen for the vertebrate palaeontology department.

Mr McHenry commented:

“I couldn’t believe our luck in finding the same bone after forty-five years.”

Dinosaur bones from South Australia are extremely rare.  The only two other bones known to science found to date are also part of the vertebrate fossil collection of the South Australian Museum.  During the Early Cretaceous period (around 110 million years ago, Albian fauna stage), when dinosaurs roamed the land, most of South Australia was under water, being part of the ancient Eromanga Sea.  The sediments deposited on the floor of this ancient sea now form the rocks of the Great Artesian Basin and preserve the abundant remains of marine life that can be viewed in the Museum’s Opal Fossil gallery.

This special dinosaur toe bone will be on display in this gallery from today (December 3rd).  Neville Pledge is now an Honorary Researcher at the South Australia Museum, it seems his discovery from 45 years ago, has now joined him at this highly respected institution.

What Sort of Dinosaur was Kakuru kujani?

Kakuru kujani (pronounced: Kah-koo-roo koo-yan-eee), is believed to be about the size of a turkey.  Unfortunately, given the limited fossil material, it is not possible to identify its taxonomic position with the Theropoda.  K. kujani was described from fragmentary lower leg bones (tibia and possible fibula fragments), the toe bone may not belong to this genus at all, but given the lack of other candidates, the Museum has assigned the bone to Kakuru.

It has been postulated that this dinosaur was an oviraptorid, although some affinity to the Abelisauridae has also been proposed.  Its formal classification remains Theropoda incertae sedis, which means it has an uncertain placement within this Suborder.

A Speculative Reconstruction of Kakuru kujani

Picture credit: South Australian Museum

Everything Dinosaur acknowledges the assistance of a press release from the South Australian Museum in the compilation of this article.

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Lisowicia bojani Huge Dicynodont from the Late Triassic of Poland

The Late Triassic of southern Poland was home to a giant “mammal-like” reptile the size of an elephant and weighing some 9 tons.  Scientists from the Polish Academy of Sciences in collaboration with colleagues from Uppsala University (Sweden), have published details on the discovery of the fossilised remains of a huge therapsid, specifically a dicynodont, that has been named Lisowicia bojani.  This super-sized, distant ancestor of modern mammals is believed to have measured around 4. 5 metres in length and stood more than 2.6 metres tall.

A Life Reconstruction of the Newly Described Giant Dicynodont Lisowicia bojani

Picture credit: Karolina Suchan-Okulska

More than 1,000 Bones Recovered from a Clay Pit

The first fossil remains were found by Polish geologists Robert Borzęcki and Piotr Menducki in 2005, when they were exploring a clay pit which represented a river deposit from the Upper Triassic.  The dig site is close to the village of Lisowice, numerous field teams have been despatched to the area and over the last few years, more than 1,000 bones and bone fragments have been collected, including the fossilised remains of a giant dicynodont.  At first the scientists thought they had discovered the fossils of a sauropod, but soon it was realised that the large and robust bones represented a therapsid.

The genus name is in honour of the nearby village, whilst the trivial name honours the German comparative anatomist Ludwig Heinrich Bojanus.

Field Team Members Excavated Fossils from the Clay Pit (Silesia, southern Poland)

Picture credit: Dr Grzegorz Niedzwiedzki (Uppsala University)

Lisowicia bojani – Defining Dicynodonts

Dicynodonts (die-sigh-no-donts), are a group of extinct, synapsids which evolved during the Permian period.  These quadrupeds were herbivorous and belong to the Order Therapsida, which includes modern mammals.  It had been thought that by the Late Triassic, these animals had died out, the discovery of L. bojani from strata estimated to be around 210-205 million years old indicates that they persisted into the Late Triassic in Europe.  The fossilised remains of Lisowicia are at least ten million years younger than any previously described dicynodont fossil material.

Commenting on the discovery, Dr Tomasz Sulej (Polish Academy of Sciences) and one of the researchers involved in this study, stated:

“The discovery of Lisowicia changes our ideas about the latest history of dicynodonts, mammal Triassic relatives. It also raises far more questions about what really make them and dinosaurs so large.”

The Massive and Very Robust Limb Bones of Lisowicia bojani

Picture credit: Dr Grzegorz Niedzwiedzki (Uppsala University)

CollectA have produced a scale model of Lisowicia bojani: CollectA Deluxe Prehistoric Life.

The discovery of Lisowicia provides the first evidence that mammal-like elephant sized dicynodonts were present at the same time as the more well-known long-necked Sauropodomorpha dinosaurs, contrary to previous belief.  Lisowicia fills a gap in the fossil record of dicynodonts and it shows that some anatomical features of limbs thought to characterize large mammals or dinosaurs evolved also in the non-mammalian synapsid.  Furthermore, these findings from Poland are the first substantial finds of dicynodonts from the Late Triassic in Europe.  Lisowicia is at least 40% bigger than any known dicynodont.

A Skeletal Drawing of Lisowicia bojani (Note Scale Bar)

Picture credit: Dr Tomasz Sulej (Polish Academy of Sciences)

Commenting on the significance of the fossil find, Dr Tomasz Sulej remarked:

“The discovery of such an important new species is a once in a lifetime discovery.”

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