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__________The Paleontograph

A newsletter for those interested in all aspects of PaleontologyVolume

_________________________________________________________________

Edited by Tom Caggiano and distributed at no charge

From Your Editor

Welcome to our Coronavirusyear in this post NJ Paleo Soc. version. Butmany more years than that. It's probably somewhere around twenty years whenwe combine the two versions. My, does time fly!!

So, if you are like me, you are sitting home, holed up, waiting for the end of life aswe know it. However, I am pretty sure you and I will both see the first issue ofnext year's Volume 10. So don't panic, stay safe, practice proper social distance,wash your hands a lot and sit back and enjoy this issue. Bob has a lot of goodstuff to share.

Be well.

The Paleontograph was created in 2012 to continue what was originally the newsletterof The New Jersey Paleontological Society. The Paleontograph publishes articles, bookreviews, personal accounts, and anything else that relates toFeel free to submit both technical and nonrange of people interested in fossils. Articles about localities, specific types of fossils,fossil preparation, shows or events, museum displaywelcome.

This newsletter is meant to be onethere is enough content to fill an issue. I encourage all to submit contributions. It will beinteresting, informative and funcontributors want it to be, so it will be a work in progress. TC, January 2012

The Paleontograph________

A newsletter for those interested in all aspects of PaleontologyVolume 9 Issue 1 March, 2020

_________________________________________________________________


[email protected]

Welcome to our Coronavirus edition. This edition marks the beginning of our ninthyear in this post NJ Paleo Soc. version. But Bob and I having been doing this formany more years than that. It's probably somewhere around twenty years whenwe combine the two versions. My, does time fly!!

So, if you are like me, you are sitting home, holed up, waiting for the end of life asow it. However, I am pretty sure you and I will both see the first issue of

next year's Volume 10. So don't panic, stay safe, practice proper social distance,wash your hands a lot and sit back and enjoy this issue. Bob has a lot of good

The Paleontograph was created in 2012 to continue what was originally the newsletterof The New Jersey Paleontological Society. The Paleontograph publishes articles, bookreviews, personal accounts, and anything else that relates to Paleontology and fossils.Feel free to submit both technical and non-technical work. We try to appeal to a widerange of people interested in fossils. Articles about localities, specific types of fossils,fossil preparation, shows or events, museum displays, field trips, websites are all

This newsletter is meant to be one, by and for the readers. Issues will come out whenthere is enough content to fill an issue. I encourage all to submit contributions. It will beinteresting, informative and fun to read. It can become whatever the readers andcontributors want it to be, so it will be a work in progress. TC, January 2012

________

A newsletter for those interested in all aspects of Paleontology

_________________________________________________________________


This edition marks the beginning of our ninthBob and I having been doing this for

many more years than that. It's probably somewhere around twenty years when

So, if you are like me, you are sitting home, holed up, waiting for the end of life asow it. However, I am pretty sure you and I will both see the first issue of

next year's Volume 10. So don't panic, stay safe, practice proper social distance,wash your hands a lot and sit back and enjoy this issue. Bob has a lot of good

The Paleontograph was created in 2012 to continue what was originally the newsletterof The New Jersey Paleontological Society. The Paleontograph publishes articles, book

Paleontology and fossils.technical work. We try to appeal to a wide

range of people interested in fossils. Articles about localities, specific types of fossils,s, field trips, websites are all

by and for the readers. Issues will come out whenthere is enough content to fill an issue. I encourage all to submit contributions. It will be

to read. It can become whatever the readers andcontributors want it to be, so it will be a work in progress. TC, January 2012

PALEONTOGRAPH Volume 9 Issue 1 March 2020

The Story of the Dinosaurs in 25Discoveries—A Review

Bob Sheridan August 4, 2019

Almost four years ago I reviewed for thePaleontograph two books: “A History of Life in 100Fossils” by Paul Taylor and Aaron O’Dea (2014) and“The Story of Life in 25 Fossils” (2015) by DonaldProthero. I recently came across another “number”book by Prothero: “The Story of Dinosaurs in 25Discoveries.”

Prothero is an adjunct professor at the CaliforniaPolytechnic University and a research associate atthe Natural History Museum of Los AngelesCounty. He is also the author of several popularbooks in paleontology and related subjects, and Ihave reviewed at least three of his books (otherthan “Story of Life”) for the Paleontograph:“Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why ItMatters”, “Rhinoceros Giants”, and “AbominableScience.” At this point I can pretty much recommendanything by this author. He has a very engagingwriting style and the information he presents is veryup-to-date.

As with “Story of Life,” in the “Story of Dinosaurs” thejumping-off point is a series of key discoveries.However, each chapter covers an entire group ofdinosaurs (tyrannosaurs, stegosaurs, diplodocids,hadrosaurs, earliest dinosaurs) represented by thediscovery. A typical chapter starts with the history ofthe discovery and ends with the latest thought andcontroversies about the group. For people like mewho like the history of science, this book is anexcellent source. It covers much of the samematerial about personalities and early dinosaurspecimens as covered in the last book Ireviewed “Assembling the Dinosaur,” but in a moreengaging way. Many times I have complained aboutbooks that claim to present the latest discoveriesabout dinosaurs. Since I follow paleontology as ahobby, from my point of view most of these booksare full of “old news”. “Story of Dinosaurs” is ahappy exception in that, while each chapter startswith something familiar, it ends with something Ihadn’t heard of before.

Here are the 25 discoveries in chapters:Megalosaurus, Iguanodon, Cetiosaurus,Hadrosaurus, Eoraptor, sauropods, Plateosaurus,Apatosaurus and Brontosaurus, Diplodocus,Giraffatitan, Patagotitan, Theropods, Coelophysis,Cryolophosaurus, Spinosaurus, Tyrannosaurus,Giganotosaurus, Deinonychus, Velociraptor,

Sinosauropteryx, ornithiscians, Henterodontosaurus,Stegosaurus, Ankylosaurus, Corythosaurus,Stegoceras, Protoceratops, Triceratops.

Since these chapters are not in chronological orderof the discovery and some chapters cover subsetsor supersets of topics covered by other chapters,you could can regard this book as “survey of thehistory of dinosaur science,” rather than a “story”with a beginning, middle and an end. This is not acomplaint; the results are very good.

Normally in a book review I would summarize eachchapter, but in this case it would be a lot of work,and I am sure you don’t want to read a ten pagereview. So I will just relate one example of the typeof discussion you can find here. Let us consider theold story of Apatosaurus vs. Brontosaurus. O.C.Marsh named both animals in the late 1870’s. Bothspecimens lacked skulls, but Marsh assigned ahypothetical blunt skull to Brontosaurus that we nowrecognize belongs to a completely different family ofsauropods, probably from Camarasaurus. By1903 itbecame clear that Brontosaurus and Apatosauruswere probably the same animal and the older nameApatosaurus took precedence. However by thattime, “Brontosaurus” was so embedded in popularculture that most museums kept the nameBrontosaurus for their mounts. It was not until the1970s that the proper skull forApatosaurus/Brontosaurus was widely accepted. In2015 a very thorough phylogenetic study ofsauropods claimed that specimens calledBrontosaurus were sufficiently different fromApatosaurus that the old genus name could beresurrected. However, this may present a problem ofecological plausibility. In modern times we hardlyever see similar large animals living in the sameenvironment at the same time, because they wouldcompete for the same resources. However, we havemany named sauropod genera from the samelocations in the Late Jurassic: Apatosaurus,Diplodocus, Barosaurus, Camarasaurus, andHaplocanthosaurus (and that is just at DinosaurNational Monument!). It seems likely that at leastsome of these names represent the same animal,and especially unlikely that two very similar animalsBrontosaurus and Apatosaurus would occupy thesame environment.

Cont"d


I would put this book on your “must read” list if youare interested in dinosaurs or the history of science.Sources:

Prothero, D.R. “The Story of Life in 25 Fossils. Talesof Intrepid Fossil Hunters and the Wonders ofEvolution.” Columbia University Press, New York,2015. 389 pages. $35 (hardcover)

Prothero, D.R. “The Story of the Dinosaurs in 25Discoveries. Amazing Fossils and the People WhoFound Them.” Columbia Universary Press, NY,2019, 472 pages $35 (hardcover).

Rieppel, L. “Assembling the Dinosaur. Fossilhunters, tycoons, and the making of a spectacle.”Harvard University Press, Cambridge Mass. 2019,325 pages $30 (hardcover).

Taylor, P.D.; O’Dea, A. “A History of Life in 100Fossils.” Smithsonian Books, Washington DC, 2014.224 pages. $40 (hardcover)

YilingiaBob Sheridan September 11, 2019

The Ediacaran Period (635-541 Myr.) is known for itsstrange mixture of soft-bodied animals. The firstknown Ediacaran deposits were discovered inAustralia (the Ediacara Hills), but there are ~30localities around the world. Some of the Ediacarananimals are like symmetrical air-mattresses inshape. Others are fronds with repeating structures atdifferent scales (i.e. fractal-like). Still others areworm-like. Since most of the time Ediacaran fossilsconsist of impressions in sediment, the appearanceof the living creature is sometimes hard toreconstruct. It has always been controversial aboutwhether these fossils even represent animals (i.e.some could be algal mats or lichens), and, ifanimals, whether these are the ancestors ofCambrian animals, or whether they represent agroup of that left no descendants. Any of the abovecould be true depending on the fossil. (Recently,opinion has shifted toward “ancestor.” ) Very fewEdiacaran animals are “bilaterans”, i.e. show rightand left symmetry. Trace fossils, tracks and burrows,etc. are often found in Ediacaran sediments, but themaker of these traces is almost always unknown.

Chen et al. (2019) describe a new Ediacaran animalfrom the Dengying Formation of south China basedon 35 specimens. They give this animal the nameYilingia spiciformes (“spiky animal from the Yilingdistrict”). Yilingia is superficially worm-like, about 27centimeters in length and about 2.5 cm wide. Front-

to-back, it consists of about 50 segments. Eachsegment has a left, right, and central portion (i.e. it is“trilobate”). The right and left lobes (lateral lobes)point backwards and downwards and end in a point(hence “spiky”). More of the central lobe is exposedon the “top” of the animal. Thus the front and back ofYilingia are differentiated as well as the top andbottom. The left and right are symmetrical. Thismakes Yilingia like most bilateran animals from theCambrian and later, and not like most Ediacarananimals. However, unlike with Cambrian animals,there is no clear “head” or other differentiation of thesegments.

There are a number of traces from the samesediments that are of the form of grooves about aswide as Yilingia. Some of the grooves have achevron pattern, while others are smooth. One tracefossil is a “mortichnum”, i.e. it is directly associatedwith a body fossil of Yilingia. (Having an animal diein its tracks, i.e. on a “death march”, while notunknown, is quite rare in the fossil record.) From thisassociation, we know for sure that Yilingia wasmobile and could burrow through sediment, whereaswe have no such evidence for most Ediacaranfauna. This suggests that some previously knownEdiacaran trace fossils could have been producedby similar animals. This brings up the question ofwhether segmentation is a necessary condition foran animal to be mobile.

The authors speculate as to whether Yilingia mightrepresent the ancestor of segmented animals suchas annelids (segmented worms) or arthropods (sincethe lateral lobes seem analogous with legs).Sources:

Barras, C.“Worm fossil recasts origins of animal life.”Nature 2019, 573, pg. 15

Chen, Z.; Zhou, C.; Yuan, X.; Xia, S.“Death march of a segmented and trilobate bilateranelucidates early animal evolution.”Nature 2019, 573, 412-415

PALEONTOGRAPH Volume 9 Issue1 March 2020

Sex Bias in Mammal FossilCollections

Bob Sheridan September 25, 2019

Male and female mammals are born with equalfrequency, but will that be reflected in fossilremains? If fossils are biased toward one sex, oursamples will not be representative of a wholepopulation. At present, determining the sex of afossil is reliable only if one can measure the relativeconcentrations of DNA “signatures” from the Xand/or Y chromosome. On the plus side, this can bedone with only fragments of bone. On the minusside, DNA is preserved only in the most recentfossils, and more likely to be preserved in colderclimates, so this can be done mostly for Pleistocenefossils recovered near the arctic. A recent studyindicated a 75% male bias (an unbiased samplewould be 50%) in a collection of 98 mammoth bonescollected across the arctic region. A new study byGower et al. (2019) followed up this study by lookingat a few more species: 186 bison fossils, 91 brownbear fossils, 9 dwarf bovids of the genus Myotragus,plus many bones from collections of modernmammals. Information was collected about theenvironment of the fossil site, including whether itwas in a cave, or whether the fossil was from thecranium or post-cranium, or whether the fossil isfrom the Alps.

The bison sample is biased at 74% male for non-cave environments but biased toward females forcave environments, the brown bear sample is biasedat 64% overall, but biased toward females for fossilsfrom the Alps. All the Myotragus specimens weremale. The modern fossil collections were sexed byobservation rather than DNA. Overall, the male ratiois larger than 50%, except for bats, sloths, andanteaters. It appears that male bias in mammalcollections is large and widespread.

Why is there such a bias in mammal fossils?Possible reasons:

1.Male bones are thicker and denser, and thus aremore likely to be preserved as fossils.2. Male bones are bigger, and fossil hunters go formore impressive “trophies.”3. Male DNA is more easily detectable or preservedbetter than female DNA.4. Males wander over more territory, and have moreopportunities to be killed in ways that wouldpreserve them, like falling into tarpits or bogs.

Since there is some environmental influence (Alps,caves), the authors favor explanation 4. However, acombination of explanation 1 and 3 is plausible, i.e.DNA is more likely to be preserved in thicker bones.

Sources:

Gower, G.; Fenderson, L.E.; Salis, A.T.; Helgen,K.M.; van Leonen, A.L.; Heiniger, H.; Hofman-Kaminska, E.; Kowalczyk, R.; Mitchell, K.J.; Llamas,B.; Cooper, A.“Widespread male sex bias in mammal fossil andmuseum collections.”Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 2019, 116, 19019-19024.

FukuipteryxBob Sheridan November 23, 2019

Since the 90’s, so many feathered dinosaurs(including dromaeosaurs) and so many early birdshave been discovered in China that the line betweendinosaur and bird is very blurred. Characteristics weonce thought were specific to birds: feathers, aretroverted pubis, a furcula, air sacs, etc. are foundin a number of theropods, even some not particularlyrelated to birds. It is debatable if Archaeopteryx istruly an ancestral bird, a non-dromaeosaur theropodclosely related to birds, or just another feathereddromaeosaur...assuming these categories areactually different.The most obvious thing about bird-like dinosaurs,dinobirds, and early true birds as a group, from theLate Jurassic to the Early Cretaceous, is that theyare often mosaics. That is, any given genus can bea mix of primitive (filamentous feathers, long tail,heavy skull, teeth, flat sternum) and advanced(asymmetric flight feathers, short tail, toothless beak,keeled sternum) characteristics, although birds fromlater times tend to have more advanced features.

Except for Archaeopteryx (from the Solnhofenlimestone quarries in Bavaria), almost all thedinobirds and early birds we know about are fromnortheast China (the Jehol Formation) and arepreserved in 2D. Imai et al. (2019) describe a basalbird specimen from the Kitandani Formation ofcentral Japan (Early Cretaceous). This is given thename Fukuipteryx prima (“first wing from theprefecture of Fukui ”). The authors especially notethe preservation is in 3D. This specimen representsan animal about pigeon size. Histological analysisshows it is less than a year old, and perhaps notfully grown. Cont'd

PALEONTOGRAPH

Fukui Cont'd

The specimen is incomplete, consisting of forelimband hindlimb elements, a few vertebrae, a furculaand the tail. However there are enoughcharacteristics that a phylogenetic analysis can bedone. Fukuipteryx turns out to be among the mostprimitive of all birds, somewhere more advancedthan Archaeopteryx (which can be considered afeathered dinosaur), but less advanced thanJeholornis, which is considered an early bird. Themost striking anomaly with this relationship is that,while Archaeopteryx and Jeholornis have long bonytails, Fukuipteryx has a short tail, called a pygostyle,which is an advanced characteristic that is found inmodern birds. This implies that the pygostyle candevelop as a convergent character and may or maynot be related to other flight-related characteristicssuch as a keeled sternum. This may be considereda surprise, as it is in this paper, or it may just beanother example of mosaicism, albeit an extremeone.

Volume 9 Issue1 March 2020

The specimen is incomplete, consisting of forelimband hindlimb elements, a few vertebrae, a furcula,and the tail. However there are enoughcharacteristics that a phylogenetic analysis can bedone. Fukuipteryx turns out to be among the mostprimitive of all birds, somewhere more advancedthan Archaeopteryx (which can be considered a

but less advanced thanJeholornis, which is considered an early bird. Themost striking anomaly with this relationship is that,while Archaeopteryx and Jeholornis have long bonytails, Fukuipteryx has a short tail, called a pygostyle,

characteristic that is found inmodern birds. This implies that the pygostyle candevelop as a convergent character and may or may

related characteristicssuch as a keeled sternum. This may be considered

in this paper, or it may just beanother example of mosaicism, albeit an extreme

The reconstruction of Fukuipteryx in the popularmedium has a large toothless beak (rather like akingfisher). Since the surangularlower jaw that does not bear teeth) is the only part ofthe skull preserved, it is a stretch to make thatassumption. More likely, since Archaeopteryx andJeholornis have teeth, Fukuipteryx did also.

Fukuipteryx also suggests primitive bifound outside China.

Sources:

Imai, T.; Azuma, Y.; Kawabe, S.; Shibata, M.;Miyata, K.; Wang, M.; Zhou, Z.“An unusual bird (Theropoda, Avialae) from the

Early Cretaceous of Japan suggests complexevolutionary history of basal birds.”Communications Biol. 2019, 2: 399.

March 2020

The reconstruction of Fukuipteryx in the popularmedium has a large toothless beak (rather like a

Since the surangular (a bone in thelower jaw that does not bear teeth) is the only part ofthe skull preserved, it is a stretch to make thatassumption. More likely, since Archaeopteryx andJeholornis have teeth, Fukuipteryx did also.

Fukuipteryx also suggests primitive birds can be

Imai, T.; Azuma, Y.; Kawabe, S.; Shibata, M.;Miyata, K.; Wang, M.; Zhou, Z.“An unusual bird (Theropoda, Avialae) from the

Early Cretaceous of Japan suggests complexevolutionary history of basal birds.”

. 2019, 2: 399.


Neandertal Social Groupby Footprints

Bob Sheridan November 22, 2019

Fossil bones provide very little insight into animalbehavior, whereas footprints or trackways give arecord of the living animal, specifically for locomotorbehavior. In some rare cases, when there arefootprints from more than one individual, somethingmight be inferred about social behavior. Forhominins, the Laetoli footprints (of Australipithecusaferensis) are a good example. Another example isthe footprints in Happisburgh, England (of Homoantecessor).

Today’s story concerns Neandertal footprints fromNormandy, France, specifically from the Le Rozelsite, which is dated to about ~80,000 years. Thissite has been explored since the 1960 and hasyielded hundreds of hominin footprints, a fewhominin handprints, many animal tracks, as well asstone tools. Duveau et. al (2019) describe a set of257 footprints in 5 trackways. About 88 of the printsare good enough to be unambiguously identified ashuman, with clear impressions of heel and toes. Thelength of the tracks varies from 11.4 to 28.7 andwidths from 4.5 to 14.2 centimeters. The individualswould be between ~70 to ~189 centimeters tall usingscaling from modern people. The number ofindividuals, based on different track sizes, is at least13. Since modern humans were not in Europe80,000 years ago, and the stone tools at Le Rozelare like those associated with Neandertals, it is verylikely these are tracks from Neandertals.

We know of enough Neandertal skeletons ofdifferent ages (measured by, e.g. tooth eruption) torelate age with size of the foot. A large majority of We

We know of enough Neandertal skeletons ofdifferent ages (measured by, e.g. tooth eruption) torelate age with size of the foot. A large majority ofthe footprints at Le Rozel would be produced bychildren and adolescence (at least one as young as2 years), with very few adults. The authors also feelthey can distinguish adult males from adult females,and both are present in Le Rozel, based on theshape of the footprints. What kind of social groupthis is, is unclear; most assemblages of Neandertalbody fossils show a majority of adults.

The authors compared the shapes of these tracks tothose of contemporary people between the ages of 1to 36, and to the Laetoli footprints. All of the printsare distinguishable by species. Neandertal feet aresomewhat wider than modern human footprints ofthe same length and have a lower arch. This isconsistent with what we know of the Neandertal andmodern human foot bones.

Sources:

Duveau, M.; Berillon, G.; Verna, C.; Laisne, G.;Cliquet, D.“The composition of a Neandertal social grouprevealed by the hominin footprints at Le Rozel.”Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 2019, 116, 19409-


Too Big to Walk—A ReviewBob Sheridan November 26, 2019

Some of us have been around long enough toremember the book “The Dinosaur Heresies”,wherein Robert T. Bakker made the case thatdinosaurs were warm-blooded, fast-growing, agilecreatures, with complex behavior, unlike mostmodern reptiles. On one hand, many of thearguments in this book were shown in the followingdecades to be oversimplified. For instance, mostpaleontologists would agree that dinosaurs occupysome middle ground between warm- and cold-blooded. On the other hand, the majority of the one-time “heresies” are now “orthodoxies,” in dinosaurscience and especially the popular mind.

I came across a new book of “heresies” called “TooBig to Walk” by Brian J. Ford. Ford is anindependent research biologist, author, lecturer, andtelevision personality. That is to say, he has noqualifications as a paleontologist. That by itself is notnecessarily bad, because many non-professionalshave contributed to dinosaur science, but readfurther on.

These are the chapters:1. Preface2. Dinosaurs and the Ancients3. Emerging from the Shadows4. The Public Eruptions5. Great American Discoveries6. Drifting Continents7. Reptile Dysfunction8. How Microbes Made the World9. Wading with Dinosaurs10. Copulating Colossus11. Truth Will Out12. The Life and Death of Dinosaurs

Normally in a review I would elaborate on eachchapter and its contents. In this case, each chapteris a mix of topics, not necessarily related to the title.Instead I will just classify the contents into threetypes:

1. Historical information on dinosaur sciencefrom the antiquity until now. This has anemphasis on how ideas on evolution,geology, and paleontology have changedradically. The author obviously identifies withthe underdogs that have minority views thateventually turned out to be correct. Twostick out in my mind. One is that the notion

of evolution came up generations beforeDarwin and one can even see antecedentsto the mechanism of “natural selection.”Therefore, the author feels that Darwin getstoo much credit. I disagree with this view.Almost any scientific idea has precursors. Itis the person who gathers enough evidenceto make a case strong enough to convincehis contemporaries who ought to get thecredit, and that is Darwin. The author alsospends a great deal of time on the idea of“continental drift” as first formulated byAlfred Wegener. Wegener accumulatedpaleontological evidence that the continentswere once joined into a single mass. At thetime (1912-1915), geologists could notenvision any mechanism that would allowcontinents to move and rejected that idea. Ittook until the 1960’s for the idea to berevived as “plate tectonics,” the idea thatcontinents are sitting on rocky plates thatfloat on top of, and are carried along with,flows of convecting magma. No one candeny that Wegener was right aboutcontinental drift, but was treated badly,mostly because he was an outsider (ameteorologist rather than a geologist orpaleontologist). One the other hand, onehas to realize it is hard to accept continentaldrift without a plausible mechanism.

2. An explanation of his aquatic theory ofdinosaurs. Much more detail in the nextparagraph.

3. Complaining that the scientific establishmentwill not let him publish his ideas in technicaljournals and therefore he needs to publishthem in this book. As a professionalscientist, I usually find complaints about howthe scientific establishment will not considerone’s ideas a red flag. There is a selectionbias in remembering “crazy ideas” fromoutsiders that eventually turn out to becorrect. For example, continentaldrift. However, in practice, only a smallfraction of crazy ideas turn out to be correct.By extension, most people who complainthat their ideas are being ignored bymainstream science don’t appreciate that itis almost always because their ideas areuntestable or otherwise contain obviousflaws.

Cont'd


The new theory in this case is that (at least) thelarge dinosaurs were aquatic, or at least spent mostof their time wading up to their hips (hippos andcrocodiles being the modern analogies) in water,although they came up to land to lay eggs. Theargument is as roughly as follows:

1. The largest animals on Earth currently areaquatic.

2. Sauropods are much too heavy to supporttheir own weight, especially since theyappear to have much more gracile legbones, than, say, an elephant, which hasone-tenth the weight of a typical sauropod.Living in water, on the other hand, wouldoffset the weight.

3. Dinosaur footprints are much shallower thanexpected given the expected weight ofdinosaurs. Sometimes trackways show hindfeet and no forefeet, and some the opposite.Some footprints seem to be claw scratchesonly. This is easily explained by assumingthe dinosaurs were wading and/orswimming.

4. Some dinosaurs have oxygen ratioindicative of an aquatic diet, plus fish scalesin the stomach contents. Spinosaurus, andBaryonyx are examples.

5. Dinosaurs, being heavy and long, would findit hard to turn. In water, on the other hand,one could use the tail to push against thewater.

6. It would be impossible for dinosaurs tocopulate on land, for example, it would betoo hard to move the tail out of the way.

7. No modern reptiles are warm-blooded, butdinosaurs seemed to have growth ratesconsistent with a constant bodytemperature. This was because they wereimmersed in warm water.

8. Some dinosaurs have nostrils at the top oftheir heads like aquatic mammals.

9. Dinosaurs became extinct when sea levelsfell and less of the land was covered inwater.

If point 2 seems familiar, up to the middle twentiethcentury the prevailing view of sauropods, at least,was that they needed the buoyancy of water toremain upright. Nowadays, sauropods are thought tobe primarily land-dwellers, although no one thinkssauropods could not swim if they wanted to. On theother hand, there is mainstream agreement thatSpinosaurus, a very large theropod, was probablyaquatic, as is Halszkaraptor, a small feathereddinosaur. The author takes credit for first thinking of

Spinosaurus a aquatic based on tooth shape andisotope ratios.

I would not even call this a “theory,” more like seriesof speculations that seem superficially plausible. Tobe claiming a theory one should have somecalculations or comparisons and should be able tomake predictions. For example, why not comparethe body shapes and weights of dinosaurs to livinganimals that are aquatic or semi-aquatic. Or ask foroxygen isotope ratios of sauropods. But we seenone of that kind of thing in “Too Big to Walk.” Mostprofessional paleontologists could easily point outdifficulties and contradictions with making mostdinosaurs obligatory aquatic animals, and could alsopoint out alternative explanations for the seeminganomalies with footprints, etc. Four difficulties thatcome to me immediately as an amateurpaleontologist:

1. Most contemporary aquatic large animalshave a barrel-shaped bodies (thinkhippopotamus) or are flattened from top tobottom (crocodilians), whereas mostdinosaurs are narrow from side to side.

2. Most large aquatic animals have someballast (e.g. solid bones) to maintain neutralbuoyancy. Dinosaurs have air sacs andhollow bones to become lighter.

3. If sauropods could walk on land to lay eggs,they could walk on land. (No fair pointing outthat sea turtles, which generally swim, cancrawl onto land to lay eggs. Sauropods hadtheir legs locked underneath their bodiesand have no method of locomotion on landother than walking.)

4. Large dinosaurs like hadrosaurs have pineneedles as stomach contents. Pine trees arenot aquatic plants.

5. That fact that some dinosaurs have aquaticcharacteristic X (e.g. nostrils at the top oftheir heads, strange oxygen isotope ratios),does not mean most dinosaurs wereaquatic.

Underneath this book, I think, is a misunderstandingby the author of how Science needs to work.Sometimes, as with other human endeavors, inhindsight ideas off the mainstream can be ignoredfor longer than they should be. However, Scienceneeds to combine open-mindedness withconservatism, so new ideas can be considered, butthe new ideas have to meet certain levels of proofbefore being accepted. Extraordinary claims musthave extraordinary proof.Cont'd


Heretical new ideas can eventually becomeorthodoxies, but arguing and by pointing outanomalies is only the beginning. One has to gatherlarge amounts of evidence and show that the newideas fit the facts better than the old ones.

I have mixed feelings about “To Big to Walk”. Thehistorical parts are actually pretty engaging andinformative. If you are going to read this book, thatwould be the main reason. You already know howlittle I am convinced about the “radical new view ofdinosaurs” presented therein, but it is usefulsometimes to read about new ideas, even when theyare not particularly convincing.

Sources:

Bakker, R.T.“The Dinosaurs Heresies. New Theories Unlockingthe Mystery of the Dinosaurs and Their Extinction.”Zebra Books, 1986, 481 pages.

Ford, B.J.“Too Big to Walk. The New Science of Dinosaurs.”

William Collins, London, 2018, 316 pages, $25(hardcover).

Amber and a Hadrosaur JawBob Sheridan December 1, 2019

Although amber from the Cretaceous is plentiful,dinosaur bones and amber are almost neverpreserved together. An exception has beendescribed by McKellar et al. (2019). The specimenunder consideration is called UALVP 53367, andwas excavated in 2010 in Dinosaur Provincial Park,Alberta, Canada. It is ~75 Myr old. UALVP 53367 isan isolated jawbone of a hadrosaur, probablyProsaurolophus. The novel aspect is that there is acircular blob of amber stuck on the lingual surface ofthe jawbone. The blob is about 7 cm in diameter and0.8 cm thick. At ~300 grams, this would be amongthe largest pieces of amber from the late Cretaceousof western Canada. The amber contains oneinclusion, an aphid in the family that is thought tofeed on conifer bark. The aphid is 0.7 mm long.

Infrared spectral analysis of the amber suggests it isthe remains of what is called “cupressaceus-araucarian” resin, which means it is probably fromeither the conifer families Araucariaceae orCupressaceae. This is not unusual for amberfragments from Dinosaur Provincial Park. The ahydrogen/deuterium ratio that suggests the amberformed not far from the Western Interior Sea at atemperature of > 33 Celsius.

Much of McKellar et al. deals with the possiblecircumstances of the association of amber with ajawbone. Clearly, the dinosaur was alreadyskeletonized and disarticulated when the amberstuck to it. However, since the jawbone appearsunweathered, it was not transported far. On theother side, since the amber contains impressions ofthe tooth rows on the lingual side of the jawbone, itwas pliable, but not liquid, when it made contact.The authors suggest that the resin mass (with theaphid already on board) and jawbone entered a riversystem at the same time, stuck together and wereburied together in sediment.

Sources:

McKellar, R.C.; Jones, E.; Engel, M.S.; Tappert, R.;Wolfe, A.P.; Muelenbachs, K.; Cockx, P.; Koppelhus,E.B.; Currie, P.J.“A direct association between amber and dinosaur

remains provides paleoecological insights.”Scientific Reports, 2019, 9, 17916.

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