[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index][Subject Index][Author Index]

DINO HUNT project: help request



sj@io.com (Steve Jackson) wrote:

<<        Our Edmontosaurus art does not show a frill along the back. Should
I worry? How certain are we of this feature, mentioned in the Dinosaur
Encyclopedia?>>

It's there. Jack Horner (and someone else?) wrote it up a few years ago in an
issue of JVP.

<<        I had understood that stegosaurs did NOT have hip spikes, period;
that the spikes formerly thought to project from the hip of, e.g.,
Lexovisaurus, were actually shoulder spikes as per Kentrosaurus? The artist
working on Lex depicted it with hip spikes. I questioned this, and got a
note back from the agent stating flatly that the spikes were on the hips.
He said he had "four books and seven scientists" to back it up, but didn't
name them . . . OTOH, the Dinosaur Encyclopedia (1993) thinks the spikes on
both species are on the shoulders. Is there something newer than 1993 that
moved some or all stegosaurian spikes back to the hips again?>>

Sorry, all so-called stegosaurian "hip spikes" are now known to be shoulder
spikes. This includes _Lexovisaurus_, in which one specimen's shoulder spikes
are the longest known dermal element in any stegosaur, bar none: more than
1.2 meters. The main question now is whether the shoulder spikes pointed
forward or backward. A Chinese specimen shows the left shoulder spike
pointing in one direction, the right in another. Which is the one that
flopped?

<<        Roccosaurus, Melanorosaurus, Euskelosaurus - what is going on? Is
this a single creature, or two, or three? What's the current correct name?>>

A very recent letter from Peter Galton to me notes that _Roccosaurus
tetrasacralis_ (never described, by the way, so it's a _nomen nudum_) will be
considered a junior synonym of _Melanorosaurus readi_ in a forthcoming paper
by van Heerden & Galton in Neues Jahrbuch fuer Geologie und Palaeontologie.
But _Melanorosaurus_ is distinct from _Euskelosaurus_.

<<        What's the deal with the apparent (early?) confusion between
Stegoceras and Troodon?>>

Gilmore (1924) thought the premaxillary fangs of _Stegoceras validum_ were
similar enough to the type tooth of _Troodon formosus_ (Leidy, 1856) to
synonymize the two genera and species. Loris Russell about two and a half
decades later demolished the synonymy, but not before several
pachycephalosaur species were created in the genus _Troodon_. Once the
synonymy was nullified, the later species went into _Stegoceras_ (and
_Pachycephalosaurus_: the type species of _Pachycephalosaurus_ was originally
described as _Troodon wyomingensis_), where they belonged.

<<        I need to find a reasonable adult standing height for Ammosaurus,
Anchisaurus, Plateosaurus and Stygimoloch. Actually, considering the
speculations about posture, hip height might be more meaningful for
Stygimoloch.>>

See the chapter on "basal sauropodomorphs" in _The Dinosauria_. _Anchisaurus_
was surprisingly small and lightly built, to those of us used to thinking of
prosauropods as rather large, ponderous animals. It also had hollow bones.

<<        I need to find hip height for Chasmosaurus, Antarctosaurus,
Saltasaurus, Titanosaurus, Shunosaurus, Mamenchisaurus.

        I need a good Amargasaurus reference for length, weight, hip height.

        I need to locate height and weight estimates for Shanshanosaurus
and Muttaburrasaurus.>>

This is one of those questions that makes me wish I had started doing _The
Dinosaur Folios_ years ago. ALL this kind of information will be available
there eventually--though not in time to help you now(!).

<<        Where has fossil material been found for Rutiodon - actual fossil
sites? My sources don't narrow it down past the continent level...>>

_Rutiodon_ is known from a variety of localities on the east coast and the
southwestern United States. It's a very widespread taxon. But beware--some of
the many _Rutiodon_ species belong outside that genus (in _Pseudopalatus_,
_Smilosuchus_, _Nicrosaurus_, and so forth).