Re: The Curious New Papers of Benjamin Button

[Tim Williams <tijawi@yahoo.com>]

Jerry Harris wrote:


> You, H.-L., Li, D.-Q., Zhou, L.-Q., and Ji, Q. 2008.
> Daxiatitan binglingi: a
> giant sauropod dinosaur from the Early Cretaceous of China.
> Gansu Geology 17(4):1-10.


This sauropod seems to have undergone an 11th hour name change.  The phylogeny 
(Fig. 3) contained in the paper calls it "Gansutitan", and the description of 
the genus gives the type species of _Daxiatitan_ as "G. binglingi".  These are 
obvious typos, and it's clear that the correct name for the genus is 
_Daxiatitan_, not Gansutitan.

The authors estimate a body length of around 30m for the live animal; but this 
is based on _Mamenchisaurus_ proportions, so it may be an overestimate.


Cheers

Tim