Re: Lizard of Oz

[twilliams@canr1.cag.uconn.edu]

Am I the only one who's a little bewildered by the heat being 
generated by the name "Ozraptor"?  "Oz", by the way (as I believe 
Brian Choo spelled out in his first posting) is a colloquialism Australians
sometimes use for Australia.  So don't get too giddy with images of
Beyond the Yellow Brick Road.   

As for inappropriate dinosaur names, here's a few to get you started.

_Arrhinoceratops_ - "no-nose-horn face."  It did indeed have a nasal 
horn.

_Diceratops_ - "two-horned face."  Like Triceratops, it probably had 
three (the absence of a nasal horn is preservational, not real).

_Mussaurus_ - "mouse lizard."  Sure, the hatchlings are small, but 
adults were probably as big or bigger than _Plateosaurus_.

_Sarcolestes_ - "flesh-thief."  Not a small carnivore as first 
thought, but a docile plodding herbivorous ankylosaur.

_Vulcanodon_ - "volcano tooth."  The volcanic bit is fine, but no 
teeth are known for this sauropod - they belong to an unrelated 
carnivore.  

And possibly...

_Pararhabdodon_ - "near Rhabdodon", which, according to a Portuguese team, 
is really a lambeosaurid.

_Protoavis_ - "first bird".  Probably not even close.