In Depth Borophagus is the last of the known line of ‘bone-crunching dogs’ (also known as ‘hyena dogs’) that roamed the plains of North America. Although Borophagus was smaller than its ancestors such as Epicyon, its skull was considerably better adapted to crushing bones. This seems to be a trait of a creature that relied … Read more
In Depth As a creature that displays both dinosaurian and avian features, it is not known for certain how Rahonavis fits in with the evolution of birds from dinosaurs. This is problem shared with other discoveries such as Xiaotingia and even Archaeopteryx as the difining line of when a bird becomes a bird and not … Read more
In Depth First discovered in 2013, and named in 2015, Morelladon made headlines towards the end of 2015 as a rare example of a sailbacked dinosaur. Though dubbed a sailback, this sail was likely more like a hump as the neural spines of the vertebrae that supported it were very robust. These are way beyond … Read more
In Depth Tuojiangosaurus was the first stegosaurid to be discovered in China, and today remains the best known from Asia. Tuojiangosaurus itself is seen as a basal (primitive) form that displays a standard stegosaurid shape and posture while retaining features that would be lost in later genera. Tuojiangosaurus seems to have been limited to a … Read more
In Depth Sinerpeton is a genus of small salamander that live in China during the last stage of the Jurassic. Further Reading - Late Jurassic salamanders from northern China. - Nature 410:574-577 - K. -Q. Gao & N. H. Shubin - 2001.
In Depth Moabosaurus is a genus of sauropod dinosaur that lived in North America during the early Cretaceous. Moabosaurus is thought to be a member Turiasauria group of sauropods. Further Reading - Moabosaurus utahensis, n. gen., n. sp., a new sauropod from the Early Cretaceous (Aptian) of North America. - Contributions from the Museum of … Read more
In Depth The type specimen of Huanhepterus was discovered when it was exposed after a quarry side was blasted by explosives. Unfortunately this blast also destroyed the right hand side of the specimen. Huanhepterus was placed within the Ctenochasmatoidea group of pterosaurs because of the large number of slender teeth, and for this reason Huanhepterus … Read more
In Depth Telicomys is a genus of very large rodent that lived in Brazil during the Miocene. At a glance, Telicomys looks very similar to genera such as Phoberomys, Josephoartigasia which also lived in South America, though a little bit after Telicomys disappeared. All of these genera are perceived to have had a similar ecological … Read more
In Depth Smilodectes is another example of an early Eocene era primate, and one of the better known from North America. As a notharctine primate, Smilodectes was similar to the type genus of the group, Notharctus. Like its relatives, Smilodectes was a small and lightly built primate that spent most of its time up in … Read more
In Depth Although based upon the description of fragmentary fossil remains, the actual discovery of Camarillasaurus is a significant revelation in itself since it is one of the few ceratosaurs known from the early Cretaceous period. This is directly in between the heyday of the ceratosaurs in the late Jurassic, and their second revival in … Read more