Webosaurs Blog

Granny Yizhousaurus

Seems like all of the good dinosaur discoveries have been coming out of China recently doesn’t it? Well here’s another very cool one, this time it’s the “grandmother” of all Sauropods! Her name is Yizhousaurus sunae and this old lady is roughly 200 million years old. Researchers are particularly excited because the skull is completely intact and researchers were able to uncover the full fossilized skeleton. Sauropods were big, heavy creatures with strongly constructed bones, but they had tiny little heads and relatively weak skulls. That is why researchers are so excited that Granny was able to keep her skull intact for 200 million years, she’s the first complete skeleton of a sauropod ever found!

What’s even more exciting is that Granny Yizhousaurus connects older, smaller Sauropods found in China to younger, bigger ones. Researchers have long been hoping to find a connection between the two and finally Granny has come along to “bridge the gap,” her skeleton was found near where skeletons of prosauropods (precursors to sauropods) were previously found. Granny does for Sauropods what Lucy did to shape the human evolutionary tree. What do you think about Granny Yizhousaurus? Why do you think so many dinosaur fossils are currently being discovered in China? Have you learned about who Lucy was and the importance of her discovery? Tell me what you think!

- Mio

Fully Grown Apatosaurus

Paleontologists have recently found fossilized foot prints of a baby Apatosaurus in the foothills to the west of Denver, Colorado. These footprints are believed to belong to the youngest and smallest Apatosaurus ever discovered. Fully grown Apatosauruses were HUGE, as long as three trucks end-to-end and weighing as much as 7 elephants combined, but this little guy was about the same size as a medium to small sized dog, like a Pug. There were two sets of baby tracks, one that was walking and another with the tracks twice as far apart that appears to be running. At one point of this dino’s run there are only hindpaw tracks and no frontpaw tracks, this is very exciting news because it confirms that this baby Apatosaurus was running on two hind legs and that’s it, like a modern day Basilisk Lizard!

Running Basilisk

It’s hard to imagine an animal as big as 7 elephants running on only it’s two hind legs, but apparently if a baby Apatosaurus was spooked enough it could get up and run like crazy! This is an amazing discovery because many Paleontologist would never have guessed that such a lumbering beast could run on only two legs, nature is truly surprising! What other incredible feats of nature have you heard about or witnessed? Leave some examples of amazing natural feats as comments.

- Mio

Just in time for Webooween... Freaky looking ants!

Seven hundred insects, all 50 million years old, were recently found on the Gulf of Cambay, off the western coast of India. Among the ancient bugs were ants, bees, spiders and termites, they had all been encased in an amber deposit from a broadleaf tree and perfectly preserved… kinda like in that famous dinosaur movie from the 1990s, I don’t remember what it’s called…

Anyway, the coolest thing about this discovery is that it changes what scientists have long thought about when India first connected to Asia. It has long been assumed that India broke away from Africa about 150 million years ago and then didn’t “crash” into Asia until about 50 million years ago. After dating the amber, scientists were expecting to find that the insects were nothing like others from around the world because India was supposed to have been isolated for about 100 million years. Much to their surprise the scientists discovered that the ancient bugs had similar characteristics to bugs from Europe, other parts of Asia and as far away as Australia.

To sum up, these seven hundred bugs provide a snapshot of what life was like in India 50 million years ago and reopens the question of where on earth India was at that time. It could have smashed into Asia much earlier than we believed or there could have been an island chain connecting the land masses, but the mystery remains, where was India?? What do you think?

Earth 50 million years ago?

- Mio

You are what you eat...

Hey Webosaurs crew, Rexxy here to clear something up… I am NOT a cannibal! Sure, sure Paleontologists have recently discovered T-Rex bite marks on other T-Rex fossils that could only mean that we were feeding on one another. Researchers are not sure if the T-Rexes that were being snacked on were killed in battle or were just found by fellow members of the species that were scavenging, but it is confirmed that T-Rex definitely ate T-Rex. And why not? I think I’d be pretty tasty AND other large carnivores tend to be cannibalistic too! Lions, Hyenas, Alligators and Polar Bears are all known to engage in cannibalism, so it’s not just us.

NOT a cannibal!

Still, I promise that I’m not a cannibal, really, If I can resist snacking on Horns, Pterry and Stretch I can resist snacking on members of my own species. Gross. I appreciate these Paleontologists’ hard work, but don’t paint us all with the same brush, just because some of us did it, doesn’t mean we all do! Stop the rumors, help me clear my name!

- Rexxy

What would you name him?

Hey gang, there’s been a new dinosaur discovered in Southwest China! This little guy may be small, but he was definitely a vicious meat eater. They were believed to have lived around 180 million years ago in China’s Yunnan province during the early Jurassic Period. This new dino was related to the Coelophysis, who lived in North America during the late Triassic. I wonder how closely they were related if they lived on opposite sides of the world during different time periods? Family reunions must have been pretty difficult! The new dino is believed to have been about 47 inches long and 27 inches tall, so about the size of large dog… only. way. more. terrifying. Chinese Paleontologists are hoping that the discovery of a new dinosaur in China may lead to more research on the evolution of Chinese dinosaurs, which would be great. This little guy is still unnamed until more research can be done. What would you name this friendly…uhhh… scary little guy?

-Mio

Nice head of hair. Wait, those are HORNS? ZOMG!!!!

Yo dinos! This is really more suitable for a Pterry’s True Science but Horns accidently dropped a boulder on him so he’s out of commission for a while (be sure to give Horns grief about that at the party on Friday). So… without further ado, let’s get to it. Paleontologists found something very cool today. In Southern Utah, they found two new species of Ceratopsian dinosaurs, closely related to Triceratops. One of them had 15 horns on its head and is the most decorated dinosaur of its kind ever found!

To add to the crazy number of horns it had, they gave the dinosaurs the most ridiculous name ever! Kosmoceratops, how crazy is that? Makes me think of a space dinosaur. Of course… looking at this guy, it would make sense. Each horn is between 6 inches (15.2 cm) and 1 foot long (30.5 cm)! For so many horns, you would think it wouldn’t look like a combover. Hah!

-Rex

Hey dinos, Silu here with the Daily Dino Fact! Today’s fact comes from EB and tells the story of a very unique Allosaurus named Big Al. Enjoy!

This is a story of an Allosaurus found in North America. 95% of his Bones were found well preserved. But he died not even full-grown and the bones were found in the same position of which he had died in. He has Many Injuries and some were found even healing. One severe injury was a swollen foot, but overall he had 11 broken bones in total. Rib injuries were thought to have been made by the whip of a diplodocus’ tail, and yet he broke his tail by falling down. Ripped arms could have been cause by fighting a female Allosaur. Females are much large and more aggressive than males. But even though big Al too all these injures he got killed by a drought, dying next to a dried up river bed, but he could have died of starvation because the swollen toe would have ended his hunting days. He died just at the age of six, not even reaching adulthood. This was an extraordinary creature, but a sad story.

-Earthbound

Hey dinos! Today’s Daily Dino Fact comes from Doggy, who wrote this awesome post about the ferocious Megalodon! Take it from here, Doggy. -Silu

Q: What is a Megalodon?

A: Well, to start off the Megalodon was a prehistoric fish. Today, I like to think of a Shark like the Megalodon because all other fish feared them, much like dinos feared the Tyrannosaurus Rex or Allosaurus. The megalodon might have been the most largest and most powerful macro-predatory fish in vertebrete  history.

Most fossil remians of this fish shows that it was the biggest shark that has ever lived back then. So, if you are wondering the name “Megalodon” actually means “Big Tooth” in it’s greek origin. A megalodon could bite down so hard that when it bites it has a much weight over 42,000 pounds! Wow!

Peace in the East!
Doggy

The claw! The CLAAAAAWWWW!!!!

Hey everyone! Today’s Daily Dino Fact comes from Irvine, who wrote this awesome post on Therizinosaurs. I’ll let him take it from here. -Rex

Q: What dinosaur had the largest claw?

A: Well, Therizinosaurus is the perfect answer! This dinosaur live on Nemegt Desert 75 million years ago, that will be on Mongolia. This dinosaurs have a claw that about 28 inch long, that’s about an adult human arm long, also this dinosaur is herbivore, eating leafs and vegetables…

This dinosaurs is in a group of Therizinosauria, the giant claw group, the dinosaur that related to this amazing species is Alxasaurus. Therizinosaurus means ‘the scythe reptile’ and a vegetarian, its claws used for cutting through trees, this dinosaurs weight is about 4-7 tons.

-Irvine

Iz all up in ur habitatz, eating ur herbivorez

Q: What was the fiercest prehistoric cat of them all? -Irvine

A: Well well well, Irvine. This is a great question. Obviously, sabre toothed cats and wooly mammoths and the like came long after the time of the dinosaurs, in the Early Pleistocene. You bring up a great point about the cats though, because most everyone knows about the famed Smilodon AKA “sabre toothed tiger” but did you know there were many other sabre toothed cats at this time?

There are at least 40 known genera of sabre toothed cats from the Pleistocene, and not all of them even come from the same family! For some reason, multiple groups of mammals evolved to have giant sharp teeth protruding out of their mouths. Nature has a funny way of experimenting with ways to eat other animals!

Who knew Little Fang was so lethal?

We can’t really say for sure which one was the MOST fierce, because you have to admit they’re all pretty gnarly. We’d have to go with Smilodon though, as they were the biggest of all of them. Some of them weighed up to 1,200 lbs (500 kg) !! That is how much a grizzly bear can weigh. Yeah, these guys were nasty. Add giant teeth that grew to 11 inches (28 cm) long and you’ve got a prehistoric killing machine on your hands.

-Rex