Tag: Cretaceous
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June General Meeting is on Friday, June 8th, 2018 – Dr. Rex Hanger from the University of Wisconsin
The June 2018 General Meeting is on Friday, June 8th, 2018. The speaker will be Dr. Rex Hanger from the University of Wisconsin – Whitewater. His program is entitled “Cretaceous Reef Paleoecology of Central Texas”. Don’t miss it!
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PBS Eons: The Weird, Watery Tale of Spinosaurus
The PBS Eons YouTube Channel has a episode about Spinosaurs. Enjoy! In 1912, a fossil collector discovered some strange bone fragments in the eerie, beautiful Cretaceous Bahariya rock formation of Egypt. Eventually, that handful of fossil fragments would reveal to scientists one of the strangest dinosaurs that ever existed — the world’s only known…
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CBC Quirks & Quarks – A new fossil reveals the first bird beak – and it came with teeth as well
CBC’s Quirks & Quarks has a segment about the first known bird beak. It belongs to Ichthyornis a bird that dates to about 80 million years ago, during the Cretaceous Period. The species was first identified in the 1870’s and named by Othniel Charles Marsh, of Yale’s Peabody Museum of Natural History. The original paper…
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Field Museum: Patagotitan Update
The Field Museum’s twitter account has an update on the new titanosaur coming to the museum in the next month or so. Recall that this Patagotitan is taking Sue’s place in the main gallery. It lived back in the middle Cretaceous of Patagonia, about 101 million years ago. One of the largest dinosaurs to ever…
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SciAm: Meet “Dracula,” the Largest Pterosaur Found to Date
Scientific American has a story about the largest pterosaur ever found. It has been nicknamed “Dracula”. It lived during the Cretaceous period. At 3.5 meters tall, it was the size of a giraffe. It is on display at the Altmuhltal Dinosaur Museum in Denkendorf, Germany. The bones were discovered by Romanian scientists in 2009 among…
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Spider-like Creature With a Scorpion’s Tail Found Trapped in Amber
The NY Times has an article about an exciting new spider-like fossil discovered in amber. Chimerarchne yingi lived during the Cretaceous Period more than 100 million years ago in what is now Southeast Asia. It’s spider-like, because it’s not quite a spider. It have 8 legs, fangs, and a whip like tail. It was only…
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Top Fossil Discoveries of 2017
The blog “Letters from Gondwana” has a post entitled “Top Fossil Discoveries of 2017”. The entries include Borealopelta markmitchelli (the ankylosaurian “mummy” discovered in Alberta), Junornis houi (a new bird from the early Cretaceous), Patagotitan mayorum (the largest and most complete titanosaur discovered to date – from Patagonia, Argentina). There’s a few more with some…
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Scientists decry Trump’s move to strip fossil treasures from Utah’s Grand Staircase monument
The Salt Lake Tribune has an article about the recent Presidential to free up parts of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument for development. There are many concerns that this change will imperil one of the world’s richest paleontological areas. Some of the researchers are now suing in federal court to halt the move. The Grand…
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National Geographic: Ticks That Fed on Dinosaurs Found Trapped in Amber
National Geographic has a story straight out of Jurassic Park. The story is about the recent discovery of blood-filled ticks trapped in Burmese amber. The amber dates to the Cretaceous period, about 99 million years old. This places the fossil firmly into the age of dinosaurs and implies that these ticks probably feed on feathered…
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NY Times: Hundreds of Fossilized Pterosaur Eggs Uncovered in China
The New York Times’ Trilobite blog has a story about the discovery of a more than 200 fossilized Pterosaur eggs. The species of pterosaur is known as Hamitpterus tianshanensis and it lived in the early Cretaceous period in what is now north western China. Xiaolin Wang discovered the eggs in a 120 million year old…
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CBC Quirks & Quarks – New dinosaur had duck legs, a swan neck and penguin flippers
CBC Radio’s Quirks & Quarks has a segment about a new dinosaur discovery. The new species is called Halszkaraptor and it lived during the Cretaceous Period about 71 to 75 million years ago in what is present day Mongolia. The original paper appeared in Nature. Halskaraptor was somewhere between the size of a chicken and…
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Waubonsie HS in Aurora is hosting a free event titles “Spinosaurus: Lost Giant of the Cretaceous” on November 17th, 2017
Spinosaurus: Lost Giant of the CretaceousMeet Spinosaurus, the largest predatory dinosaur yet discovered—larger than T. rex—and hear the incredible story of how this prehistoric giant was almost lost to science, before being brought back to light with the help of a remarkable young paleontologist, Dr. Nizar Ibrahim, a National Geographic Explorer With amazing video recreating…
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NatGeo: Why Pterosaurs Were the Weirdest Wonders on Wings
National Geographic Magazine has a interesting story in their November 2017 issue. Large and small pterosaurs are some of the strangest animals to ever live. They went extinct 65 million years ago during the end Cretaceous mass extinction event. This article has many details and great pictures which describe what and who pterosaurs were during…
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Four-legged snake fossil found
CNN has an interesting video about a 110-million-year-old snake fossil. The was discovered in Brazil and dates to the Cretaceous period. Its most interesting feature… the snake had 4 legs! Scientists hope it sheds light on how and why snakes lost their legs.
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New Book on Hell Creek Formation from GSA
From the Geological Society of America: Full Title: Through the End of the Cretaceous in the Type Locality of the Hell Creek Formation in Montana and Adjacent Areas Editors: Gregory P. Wilson, William A. Clemens, John R. Horner, and Joseph H. Hartman Description: For over a century, the Hell Creek and Fort Union formations and their constituent…
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Lecture Tonight: New Cretaceous Allosauroids by Peter Makoviky
General Meeting: 8:00 p.m. College of Dupage, Building K, Rm 161. Peter Makoviky from the Field Museum of Natural History, speaking on “New Cretaceous Allosauroids from the Americas.”
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Amber Yields Clues to the History of Oxygen in Earth’s Atmosphere
Via geology.com: Gas bubbles trapped in amber show an oxygen-rich Cretaceous atmosphere Republished from an information release posted by USGS in June, 2009. In addition: amber in India’s Cambay area has new information too.
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Events This Weekend
Friday, April 9 – ESCONI General Meeting. Dr. Bucky Gates , Assistant Professor at Lake Forest College, will be the speaker at 8:00 p.m. College of Dupage Building K, Room #131. Dr. Gates will talk on Reconstructing Paleoecosystems Through Microvertebrate Taphonomy. Reconstructing ancient ecosystems is one of the primary aims of paleontology. However, the burial…
