Top 10 Prehistoric Creatures pictured accidentally

You know, it’s easy to see how we’ve misinterpreted fossils.  It’s difficult for any part of an animal to fossilize, so complete specimens are rare and really special.  So inaccurate palaeoart is inevitable, and really not surprising at all.  Then there are the times when reconstructions accidentally depict a different animal entirely unintentionally. We all know about how Tyrannosaurus was originally reconstructed on Allosaurus and Apatosaurus on Camarosaurus, but they’re not alone. Sometimes it’s because of misidentification, and sometimes it’s simply due to laziness in paleontological reconstructions.  Here are the top 10 Prehistoric Animals people picture when they try to picture a different animal (there has to be a specific word for this phenomenon. I’m sure there’s one in German or something).

Documentary Review: Walking With Monsters 2005

Well, it’s been a long time coming, but it’s finally time we finish the “Walking With” trilogy. True, there’s the three Chased by Dinosaurs specials and Allosaurus and Walking With Cavemen, but this one is the closest to the original in terms of structure.  It’s very different, however, in many ways, from running time to presentation. It’s certainly ambitious and explores much-neglected times and places in prehistory. People often forget that these periods existed, and only the trilobite, Dimetrodon, and possibly Meganuera as familiar to most of the public. They’ve always played second fiddle to dinosaurs, so much that Dimetrodon is more often placed with dinosaurs than with fellow Pelycosaurs. It’s telling that in the former exhibit Life Over Time, there was a corridor visitors could take to bypass the entire Palaeozoic and go straight to the dinosaurs (thankfully, Evolving Planet does not). It’s certainly the longest in terms of time periods covered, while it’s much shorter in running time: at 90 minutes, it’s half the length of the first two.  So without further ado, let’s look at the prehistoric clip show to see how they can deal with 280 million years of evolution in one and a half hours.

An Overview of Dinosaur Exhibits Part Three: The Field Museum

I think everyone has their favorite place in the world, a place that just restores their life, a place tied up with countless memories. It can be a house or a park, or a stadium, or a school.  For me it was the Field Museum of Natural History on the East Side of Chicago near Grant Park. I can’t remember when I first went. It might have been in 1991, or even as a baby.  You see, when I lived in Chicago, you could go to the library and get passes for the Field Museum, Art Institute, Shedd Aquarium or the Adler Planetarium. My mother didn’t have a job at the time, so she would take me, my mother, and our two cousins to the museums and zoos of Chicago. 

Paleontology Wish List for 2014

Everyone has a wish list for their friends or their family to give them.  Some people have political wish lists, or try to get in touch with their spirituality through goals. I myself have wish lists for Christmas and my birthday. However, this is a paleontology wishlist, a list of all the discoveries and insights I hope will happen in 2014.   I know most paleontology is based on the combination of persistence and luck, but here’s hoping at least one of these will happen in the next year

Belated Halloween post: Top Ten Scariest Prehistoric Environments

Sorry this took so long!  I was hoping to get this done by Halloween, but it took a week to get this one out. Next time I’ll do monster posts like this one in installments. Today we’re going for another lighthearted one-yes, we’re going to do a top ten list today. This one’s been inspired by the documentary series Sea Monsters, where host Nigel Martin took the audience through the “top 7 deadliest seas”. In the same spirit, I’ve chosen the top 10 Deadliest Terrestrial faunas, based on the number of large predators. If I missed any that deserved to be on this list, please let me know. This isn’t based on any particular grade, but based on the number of large predators present in the fauna.

Species that don’t get enough publicity #1- Diadectes sideropelicus

Ah, Dimetrodon. The only nonmammalian synapsid  (basically the ancestors of modern mammals) ever to become an honorary dinosaur.  It’s ubiquitous in art, toys, and museums. It’s better known than hundreds of dinosaurs, let alone members of its own group. Sometimes Dimetrodon lies right between lobe-finned fish and Stegosaurus in a march of history. That sail overshadows the Triassic, Permian, and Carboniferous periods. Sometimes other Permian animals show up in popular culture-Eryops, looking like nothing else but a crocodile frog, or Edaphosaurus, which is just the plant eating version of Dimetrodon (And so, not as popular), but it’s all Dimetrodon.
 

That’s why I’m not going to talk about Dimetrodon anymore.  Instead, I’m going to talk about an animal I find actually more interesting.  It was probably harmless (on the other hand, even Dimetrodon probably wouldn’t be any more dangerous than an alligator, Nile Monitor or Tasmanian devil), about the size of a large dog, and people have struggled for years whether it’s a reptile of an amphibian. The American, Field, and Harvard museums all have one right next to their Eryops, Dimetrodon, etc, but it’s probably overlooked by most visitors.