tetrapodzoology | July 23, 2007
Just a very quick post before I get back to work... Regular Tet Zoo readers will know that - for my shame - I'm a pathological collector of toy/model animals [for more, go to the ver 1 articles here and here]. One of the things I did over the weekend was acquire some fantastic new models, all produced by the German toy company Schleich. They are so awesome I just had to share the news. Clockwise from right to left, the animals on the ground are a musk ox, Smilodon, cave bear and Torosaurus. The cave bear is awesome. The Smilodon isn't tremendously good, and I admit I bought it because I…
tetrapodzoology | July 21, 2007
It isn't every day that your friends make the cover of Science magazine. Belated congrats to my friend Randy Irmis and his colleagues Sterling Nesbitt, Kevin Padian and others for their neat work on the dinosauromorph assemblage of Hayden Quarry, New Mexico (Irmis et al. 2007). Exciting stuff. Why? Well...
At Hayden Quarry, Norian-aged sediments of the Chinle Formation preserve temnospondyls, drepanosaurids, aetosaurs and diverse other crurotarsans, and dinosauromorphs. The big deal is this: despite the Late Triassic date of the assemblage, Irmis et al. (2007) have been able to demonstrate…
tetrapodzoology | July 18, 2007
Long-time blog readers will know that I am atrocious at keeping promises. And I will confess that part of the reason for titling an article 'Goodbye Tetrapod Zoology' was to cause a burst of panic, a rash of visitors (the strategy didn't really work: look at the counter... no spike on the graph). In seriousness, fear ye not oh followers, as I will indeed keep the blog ticking over, it's just that the only things I'll post will be short and sweet. And, unfortunately/fortunately, some bits of news come in that just demand a quick write-up...
Lurking in the Tet Zoo shadows are a number of…
tetrapodzoology | July 17, 2007
You all know that I'm just dying to publish those articles on biarmosuchians, dinocephalians and edaphosaurids, not to mention the dinoceratans, astrapotheres, pantodonts, pantolestans and nesophontids that I've been busy with lately. Then there are the stem-group monstersaurian lizards, the palaeophiids, the miniature ground sloths, the meiolaniids, the giant iguanas; and those long-overdue articles on Piltdown, de-hominization, knuckle-walking, amphisbaenians, tortoises, kinglets and (cough) Eotyrannus. The fact is, I just don't have the time. And time is such a problem right now...
...…
tetrapodzoology | July 16, 2007
Among the many, many groups I have yet to cover on Tet Zoo are stem-group synapsids: Synapsida is the tetrapod clade that includes mammals and all of their relatives, and there is a long tradition of referring to non-mammalian synapsids as 'mammal-like reptiles' (other names include protomammals and paramammals). Because synapsids are not part of Reptilia*, referring to them as 'mammal-like reptiles' is both technically incorrect and misleading, hence the push to use their proper name.
* Reptilia and Synapsida are sister-taxa within the tetrapod clade Amniota.
The photo here was provided by…
tetrapodzoology | July 12, 2007
Hooray: another of those articles that I've been promising to publish for weeks and weeks.
Thanks mostly to the importance of the species in the international pet trade, the Green iguana Iguana iguana is typically imagined as a rather uninspiring lizard that sits around on branches all day long, occasionally munching on salad or sitting in its water bowl. It's true that some captive individuals become remarkably charismatic and idiosyncratic, but for the most part the Green iguana is generally thought of as a rather dull animal that doesn't really do much of interest. Today we're going to…
tetrapodzoology | July 11, 2007
Today I had good reason to send to Markus Bühler - my good friend and an avid Tet Zoo supporter - several images of entelodonts. What the hell, I thought, why not share one of these images with the rest of you. This awesome life-sized model depicts the Oligocene-Miocene North American entelodont Daeodon (formerly better known by its synonym Dinohyus) and is on display at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. It's a shame there's no scale in the photo: Daeodon was huge (c. 1.8 m tall at the shoulder). The model is fantastically accurate: it even has snot in its nostrils.
As was previously…
tetrapodzoology | July 9, 2007
This photo depicts an assortment of hominid species, including most of the australopithecines and Homo ergaster (front left, facing camera). A neanderthal is at top right. The reconstructions (obviously, these are photos of the models) were produced by Wolfgang Schnaubelt and Nina Kieser in co-operation with GEO-magazine; an exhibition displaying the models opened in 1998 at the Landesmuseum, Darmstadt (Germany), which is where this photo was taken. Photo taken in 2005 by D. Martill.
Oh yeah, and...
... (given that it was only a matter of time before someone made the 'grad students' joke)…
tetrapodzoology | July 9, 2007
At last, I fulfill those promises of more temnospondyls. Last time we looked at the edopoids, perhaps the most basal temnospondyl clade: here we look at the rest of the basal forms. Scary predators, marine piscivores, late-surviving relics, and some unfortunate beasts burned alive in forest fires...
Studies on temnospondyl phylogeny mostly agree that 'post-edopoid' temnospondyls form a clade, the most basal members of which include Capetus, Dendrerpeton and Balanerpeton (Milner & Sequeira 1994, 1998, Holmes et al. 1998, Ruta et al. 2003a, b) [though some workers have found some of these…
tetrapodzoology | July 5, 2007
To date, I would say that all the 'mystery pictures' I've posted have been way too easy, as is demonstrated by the fact that the vast majority of visitors are able to guess them correctly straight away...
A baboon skull. Frogmouth bristles. A paca's head. The problem is, when you're preparing such a picture it's quite difficult to know how easy or difficult it is. Take this picture here. To me the identity of the creature is really obvious, but that might be because I am, obviously, familiar with the original image. So I think it's dead easy, and maybe it is. I won't be surprised if you all…
tetrapodzoology | July 4, 2007
Today I submitted another one of those long-delayed manuscripts. Yay. I also got to work preparing one of the three conference talks I'm supposed to be giving this year - how the hell I'm going to pull off all three I'm not sure. Anyway, leaving well alone the whole picture-of-the-day debacle, it's time for a proper post. Last time we looked at the edopoids, one of the most basal clades of temnospondyls, and in the next post I plan to write about some of the other basal temnospondyls.
Ever trying to recycling old text that sits, un-used, on disks, drives and memory-sticks, here I'm going to…
tetrapodzoology | July 3, 2007
Ok, the game is up - let's all just pretend that that ugly little paca episode never happened (it has been consigned to 'below the fold': view at your peril). Just so you feel you're getting your money's worth, here's another picture, but not one where you're supposed to guess what it is, as of course you don't need to. It is the amazing brachiosaurid skull HMN t1, discovered at Tendaguru Hill, described by Janensch in the 1920s and 30s, and displayed today at Berlin's Museum für Naturkunde. HMN t1 is c. 70 cm long, and with a mouth c. 22 cm wide (and it is not small for the size of the…
tetrapodzoology | July 2, 2007
No temnospondyls for you: mystery pictures strike back! Congratulations in advance to the bright spark who can successfully identify what's shown above - and you don't have to get the identification down to the species, the genus will do. To the rest of you, commisserations in advance. No time for a post today, but coming next: Crassigyrinus, giant Carboniferous tadpole from hell (© Tet Zoo 2007. All rights reserved).
UPDATE (added 3-7-2007): the answer is...
As so many of you correctly guessed, it's part of a frogmouth, and in particular a Tawny frogmouth Podargus strigoides, the only one…
tetrapodzoology | June 29, 2007
Like plethodontid salamanders, Wealden dinosaurs, and rhinogradentians, the remarkably successful and diverse tetrapods known as temnospondyls have been riding the Tet Zoo wagon right since the earliest posts of ver 1. But, to my shame, I've never gotten round to completing one of the ten or so posts that I plan to publish on them. If you're interested in tetrapod evolutionary history and haven't heard of temnospondyls before, it's time to get learning, as they were one of the most diverse, abundant and ecologically significant tetrapod groups of the Palaeozoic and early Mesozoic [adjacent…
tetrapodzoology | June 27, 2007
Many, many thanks to everyone who took the time to think about, and comment on, the Erongo carcass (featured on Tet Zoo yesterday). As you might know if you checked the news article, this naturally mummified carcass was discovered in 2002 (or so) in a cave in the Erongo Mountains, Namibia. Local people were unable to identify it, and it was brought to my attention by Dr George Tucker who was able to view and photograph it in 2003. George attempted to determine the carcass's identity by asking various experts, but was unable to solicit a definitive response. I'm not a professional mammalogist…
tetrapodzoology | June 25, 2007
Another mystery photo for everyone to guess at. And in fact this specimen isn't just any old dead animal...
... it's internationally famous, having been widely discussed in the news media [see article here], and the subject of correspondence between mammalogists across the USA. It has variously been identified as a dinosaur or as some sort of embryo, but is clearly the mummified carcass of a mammal. It was discovered in a cave in Namibia. This photo was kindly supplied by George Tucker, who is keen to determine its identity: I regret that we need to retain the rights on the image, hence the…
tetrapodzoology | June 25, 2007
During recent weeks, I've written on a couple of occasions about my intention to get through the list of long-promised and nearly-finished articles: they include Amazing social life of the green iguana, Beluwhals and proto-narwhals, more on sebecosuchians, Triassic crurotarsans, Whence the onza, vampire pterosaurs, Piltdown, What did a dinoceratan do, astrapotheres and pyrotheres, tortoises tortoises tortoises... the list goes on. Right now I'm going to resist the urge to write a new article about baboons (more on them later), but am instead going to deal with something that needs doing as…
tetrapodzoology | June 21, 2007
Given all the fun that everyone had recently with the Southern sea lion skull, I thought you'd all enjoy the chance to have a go with another specimen. This one's a lot easier, no prizes for getting it right. Let battle commence!
PS - yesterday's artice on sea lions was ver 2's 100th entry - wahey!
tetrapodzoology | June 21, 2007
Well done and many thanks to everyone who tried identifying the mystery skull published on the blog yesterday. And as several people correctly worked out...
.... it belonged to a pinniped, and more specificially to an otariid, and to a sea lion. Well done in particular to Andrés Rinderknecht and Rafael Tosi: it is indeed the skull of a Southern sea lion Otaria byronia (more appropriately termed the South American sea lion or Patagonian sea lion), and a big old gnarly male at that (like the one pictured in the adjacent image). The specimen was collected from the Falkland Islands in the 1930s…
tetrapodzoology | June 20, 2007
I can't see that I'm going to have the chance today to post an article, so here's another picture. Sorry it's not the best photo in the world. But the question is...
... whose skull is it? Well, I know what it is of course - but do you? Invariably the reaction from laypeople has been that it must be from a dinosaur. But then, I lost count of how many children identified a horse skull as that of a Tyrannosaurus rex at the recent Springwatch festival. And no cheating from those who have seen the exact same photo before! This reminds me - I never gave Adam Yates his prize for being king of the…