Some silly misinformed journalists' been at it again!

[jshields@iol.ie (James Shields)]

Hi folks,

Yesterday an article appeared in the kids section of an English national
paper, The Sunday Times. It appeared in a section titled The Intelligent
Cod. Hopefully I won't get into any trouble with copyright by quoting it here.

        Birkdale, the Cod's Dogfish, is a sweet-tempered pet, but I 
        have seen him in a new light after news from New Zealand.
        Palaeontologists (dinosaur hunters) have made a startling 
        find: a fossilised dog, 60 feet long, and nicknamed 'Jurassic 
        Bark'. Old JB was a Canisaurus, a dog-like monster with 
        leathery skin, brain-crunching fangs, and stomach-ripping 
        claws. "He used his claws like a monkey, for holding prey and 
        shredding victims," dino expert Anthony Boswin tells the Cod. 
        The 10 tonne pooch was found buried in a cave apparently 
        guarding a store of chewed bones. Good to know that even 160 
        million years ago, you couldn't seperate a dog from its bone.

Anyone have any thoughts on this? I know this reporter has got mixed up
somewhere. 160 mya would put it in the late Jurassic, but as far as I know
the only things 60 feet long were sauropods (which weren't carniverous).
There certainly weren't any big mammels. Have land mammels ever reached this
sort of size?

There's only one thing for reporters like this...

Press 1 for chainsaw! RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRW! SPLAAAAT! (Doomspeak) :-)

James


James Shields  -  jshields@iol.ie  -  http://www.iol.ie/~jshields
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And when the ark was finished Noah said unto Elvis, "What do you reckin?"
And Elvis checked out his own cabin and shook his head saying "poky".
And so did they knock several walls through and install a jaccuzzi.
And when it was all done Noah scratched his beard and said, "We don't have
room for all the animals now."
And Elvis perused the livestock list and in his wisdom said, "Lose the
dinosaurs."
        -Robert Rankin, The Suburban Book of the Dead