pterosaurs
tetrapodzoology | September 18, 2007
The day-job, a dinner date, a committee meeting, and some work identifying Tanzanian reptiles from photos means that I don't have time to post more conference thoughts on the blog today. In, as always, an effort to keep hits coming in (remember: visit, visit, and visit again), I'll therefore default to the 'picture of the day' game...
By now, I'm guessing that everyone who's been reading the stuff on the Wellnhofer pterosaur meeting has seen the above pic: Mark Witton used it in his talk on pterosaur mass estimates - he discusses that issue here, and I'll say things about it whenever I post…
tetrapodzoology | September 17, 2007
I've caught up on my sleep; I've watched the Star Wars trilogy and The Wicker Man; I've listened to at least one Kate Bush album (well, two.. ok, three); and I've spent an appropriate amount of time catching up with my family (on Sunday we went to Longleat Safari Park). While it's true that I have thoughts on three quite different conferences to report, I thought that I'd start by writing about the one that's freshest in my mind - and, anyway, I have to write up a proper article on this specific conference for publication, so it helps if I do this now. As readers will know (first thoughts…
tetrapodzoology | September 15, 2007
As a famous lady recently said: "I'm back". At last - having just returned from the Peter Wellnhofer Flugsaurier Conference (held at the Bayerische Staatssammlung für Paläontologie [BSP] in Munich) - conference season is at an end and I can try to return to normal life. At the risk of spouting forth with the usual gushing over-enthusiastic hyperbole I have previously engaged in on returning home from conferences, it was an awesome meeting that I really, really enjoyed. I'll cover a few highlights here, but am planning to discuss more details later on (the conference blog can be seen here).…
tetrapodzoology | September 3, 2007
In celebration of the upcoming Flugsaurier conference (conference # 3), I thought I'd post some nice pterosaur pictures. I'm speaking at the meeting, so am spending 'spare' time on pterosaurs and not much else (I am happy to report that I'm able to continue with the day-job on marine reptiles - more on that in the future). The large picture is yet another I've nicked from Mark Witton: it depicts the Lower Cretaceous Chinese dsungaripterid pterosaur Dsungaripterus weii Young, 1964, and for the full-size version of the picture (this version is cropped and resized) you need to go here. Mark was…
tetrapodzoology | May 20, 2007
Another one of those projects too-long-in-gestation has finally appeared and, unlike the others (e.g., the much-delayed British dinosaurs article), it's one that I haven't previously mentioned on the blog (I think). For the last couple of years I've been working, on the side as it were, with University of Bristol's Barbara Sánchez-Hernández and Mike Benton on the fossil vertebrates from the Galve region of Teruel Province, NE Spain. This is a really rich site, best known for its sauropods and mammals, and it's been the focus of much research since the 1950s. Our new paper - a large synthesis…