In Depth Further Reading – Review of the Vertebrata of the Cretaceous period found west of the Mississippi River – Edward Drinker Cope – 1874. – Vert�br�s fossiles du bassin du Niger [Fossil vertebrates of the Niger basin] – C. Arambourg & L. Joleaud – 1943. – A check list of North American Marine Cretaceous … Read more
In Depth Microceratus was actually first named all the way back in 1953 as Microceratops from partial remains discovered in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia. Just over fifty years later however it was realised that Microceratops had already been used to name a genus of wasp, and so this dinosaur was renamed as Microceratus. Microceratops … Read more
In Depth As an ancient member of the pristidae, Onchopristis would have been more closely related to rays than to sharks. Like modern day sawfish, Onchopristis would have used the rostrum that extended for as much as two and a half meters in front of it to sense prey. Once prey was detected, Onchopristis would … Read more
In Depth Originally listed as a species of Dipnorhynchus, Westollrhynchus was described as a distinct genus of sarcopterygiian fish in 2001. Further Reading - A Primitive Dipnoan Fish from the Lower Devonian of Germany. - W. Lehmann & T. S. Westoll - 1952. - Melanognathus, a Primitive Dipnoan from the Lower Devonian of the Canadian … Read more
In Depth When the description of Pegomastax was first publically released news headlines of ‘Dracula dinosaur’ and ‘Fanged vampire parrot’ soon flooded the internet. Pegomastax however seems to be one of the heterodontosaurid dinosaurs, and although some palaeontologists have speculated that these kinds of dinosaurs used their teeth to eat small prey like lizards and … Read more
In Depth When Richard Owen first established the Dinosauria, and thus creating the term dinosaur in 1842, Hylaeosaurus was one of the three genera used to establish the group (the others were Megalosaurus and Iguanodon). Several species of Hylaeosaurus have been named over the years, but the only species currently thought to be valid is … Read more
In Depth Mongolostegus is a genus of stegosaurid dinosaur that lived in Asia during the early Cretaceous. Unfortunately details about Mongolostegus are hard to determine due to the overall lack of fossil remains for the genus. Further Reading - First Record of Stegosaur (Ornithischia, Dinosauria) from the Aptian-Albian of Mongolia. - Paleontological Journal 52(14). - … Read more
In Depth Foraminacephale is a genus of small pachycephalosaurid dinosaur that lived in North America during the late Cretaceous. Fossil material of Foraminacephale was originally assigned to the Stegoceras genus as the species S. brevis, but became the basis of a new genus in 2016 (Schott & Evans). Several partial skulls of Foraminacephale are are … Read more
In Depth Although Nikkasaurus is a therapsid, the skull bears a superficial resemblance to varanopid pelycosaurs in terms of overall proportions and shape. Nikkasaurus lived in Russia during the Permian. Further Reading – The Nikkasauridae-Problematic Primitive Therapsids from the Late Permian of the Mezen Localities. – Paleontol. J.34 (Suppl. 2), 179–186. – M. F. Ivakhnenko … Read more
In Depth Not a lot is known about Isfjordosaurus other than it was a basal ichthyosaur from the early Triassic. Further Reading – Phylogeny of the Ichthyopterygia. – Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 19(3):473-496. – R. Motani – 1999.