In Depth Kryptops is a little known genus of abelisaurid theropod dinosaur that lived in North Africa during the Early Cretaceous. At the time of the original description in 2008, Kryptops was considered to be the most primitive known abelisaurid. Kryptops was described from a partial maxilla (main and posterior tooth bearing bone in the … Read more
In Depth Bagualosaurus is a genus of sauropodomorph dinosaur that lived in South America during the late Triassic. Bagualosaurus seems to have been somewhat transitional in form in that the skull and tooth arrangement are like those of later sauropodomorph dinosaurs such as Plateosaurus and Efraasia, yet the main body of Bagualosaurus is more theropod-like, … Read more
In Depth Originally named as a species of Eudimorphodon, Arcticodactylus is a genus of small pterosaur that was flying in the skies above Greenland during the late Triassic. Back when Arcticodactylus lived, Greenland was much warmer that what it is today. Further Reading - Comments on Triassic pterosaurs with discussion about ontogeny and description of … Read more
In Depth Latirhinus should not be confused with Altirhinus, as not only do they have similar sounding names (only difference being the position of the ’l’ and ’a’ at the start), both were hadrosaurs and both were named after the enlarged bony protuberances on their snouts. Latirhinus was a form of saurolophine hadrosaur, a type … Read more
In Depth Xinpusaurus is one of the better known thalattosaurs, and like others it had a laterally compressed tail that was suited to providing underwater locomotion as it hunted for prey like fish. Thalattosaurs still possessed four limbs though, not only betraying their terrestrial ancestry, but also indicating that they probably returned to the shore … Read more
In Depth Fossils of Australodocus were first recovered in 1909 by the famous German palaeontologist Werner Janensch, however they were not described until 2007. Further to this, not all of the original specimens could be studied since many of them were destroyed in World War 2. Out of the surviving bones, some of the vertebrae … Read more
In Depth Originally named as species of Theriosuchus, Sabresuchus is a genus of crocodylomorph that lived in Europe during the Cretaceous. Further Reading – Survival of Theriosuchus (Mesoeucrocodylia: Atoposauridae) in a Late Cretaceous archipelago: a new species from the Maastrichtian of Romania. – Naturwissenschaften. 97 (9): 845–854. – Martin Jeremy, Rabi M�rton & Csiki Zolt�n … Read more
In Depth Caudipteryx the animal. Caudipteryx is one of the most primitive oviraptosaurs so far known to us, only the genus Incisivosaurus is known to be older at the time of writing. The skull of Caudipteryx can be easily described as being box-like, and the jaws are already formed into a beak. Teeth are still … Read more
In Depth Nakonanectes is a genus of elasmosaurid plesiosaur that would have hunted in the Western interior seaway during the late Cretaceous period. Nakonanectes is noted for having short cervical vertebrae and an estimated length of only about five and a half meters at most for the holotype individual. This is small for an elasmosaurid … Read more
In Depth The name Pareisactus means ‘intruder’, and this came about from the observation that out of several hundred hadrosaur bones, a single fossil of a scapula (shoulder blade) belonging to a rhabdodont dinosaur was found. This scapula was subsequently used to name the genus Pareisactus. Like hadrosaurs, rhabdodonts like Pareisactus were plant eating dinosaurs. … Read more