Spotted in the wild, a do-gooder hoping to reunite this lost raptor with his or her undeniably heartbroken owner.

Seems Legit is a post from: The Inquisitr

Autocomplete, Dinosaurs Edition is a post from: The Inquisitr

The oldest known dinosaur nesting site has been uncovered by paleontologists in South Africa’s Golden Gate Highlands National Park.

Dating to 190 million years ago, the dino nursery is said to contain multiple nests, eggs, hatchlings and the remains of adults of the Massospondylus species. These herbivores were related to the more widely known Sauropod, and walked on their hind legs (though babies moved about on all fours initially).

Project leader Robert Reisz told LiveScience:

“The transition from four legs to two during an individual’s lifetime is a very unusual growth pattern that we rarely see in animals, but we do see it in humans. The largest articulated skeleton of this animal was about 6 meters (19.7 feet) in length, but they probably grew even larger.”

The discovery of the nesting site is the oldest evidence to date for a rigidly organized nest. Reisz described how the eggs were laid out carefully in a single layer:

“The nests seem to be fairly shallow because all the eggs are in one layer. We do not know if the nests were covered by vegetation or if they were buried because the nature of the sediments preclude the preservation of plant fossil remains. It is quite possible that the mother guarded the nests.”

Researchers have located ten dinosaur nests at the site so far, but anticipate they will find many more embedded within the South African cliff. It is believed Massospondylus would lay as many as 35 eggs at a time, a survival strategy due to the high number of meat-eating predators that stalked the region at the time.

[Via LiveScience]

Oldest Dinosaur Nursery Discovered in South Africa is a post from: The Inquisitr

Paleontologists have known about the Alamosaurus for years, and they believed they had a fairly accurate estimate of its size and weight, but it turns out they were wrong.

Denver Fowler, a researcher at Montana State University, and State Museum of Pennsylvania’s Robert Sullivan came to the conclusion that the Alamosaurus was significantly more massive than originally thought after examining fossils they collected in New Mexico between 2003 and 2006.

Fowler estimates that the Alamosaurus could have been 80 feet tall and weighing in at roughly 70 tons, give or take a few pounds. The fossils the two examined were two vertebrae and a leg bone from the long-necked herbivore.

Fowler and Sullivan originally thought that the two vertebrae recovered were whole pieces of vertebrae, not fragments. “We dug around it and surrounded it in plaster, then we flipped it over to get it out of the ground- that was the point at which we could see what we actually had was not all that much,” Fowler said.

Assuming Fowler and Sullivan are correct in their estimates, the Alamosaurus would be around the same size as the massive South American Argentinosaurus, which also weighed 70 tons.

“Over the past 20 years, Argentinean and Brazilian paleontologists have been unearthing bigger and bigger dinosaurs, putting the rest of the world in the shade,” Fowler said. “However, our new finds not only show that Alamosaurus is newly recognized as the biggest dinosaur from North America, but also that it was right up there with the biggest South American species: The U.S. is back in the fight for the No.1 spot.”

via MSNBC

[Image credit: Artist's conception of the Alamosaurus sanjuanensis by Mariana Ruiz Villareal]

Alamosaurus crowned the largest dinosaur in North America is a post from: The Inquisitr

Fossilized dinosaur teeth have thrown new light on the behavior of gigantic plant-eating dinosaurs called sauropods.

According to a study conducted by researchers at Colorado College, these huge beasts would migrate hundreds of miles from their home during dry spells to locate food and water. This is the first evidence that tells us some dinosaurs migrated to overcome shortages of seasonal food.

If you’re like me and find dinosaurs fascinating (and if you don’t, WHY?), you may be interested to know that dinosaurs lost their teeth and grew new ones every six months. The new growths would contain elements from the food and water consumed by each dinosaur, with elements differing by location.

So this is where the science comes in. This fresh study focuses on oxygen-18 isotopes in dinosaur teeth. The white coats found that the water and plants in low altitude regions of North America boasted relatively high levels of oxygen-18. It was already known that plants in high altitude locations contained lower levels of oxygen-18.

When measuring the levels of oxygen-18 in sauropod teeth in low altitude regions, scientists found the dinosaurs’ isotope levels were lower than the levels found in the basin. This would logically mean the dinosaurs had departed the basin at some point and returned later.

Says study researcher Henry Fricke:

“Sauropods in western North America were living in an environment that was seasonally dry, that has a pronounced wet season and a pronounced dry season. If you have an animal that needs to eat a lot and drink a lot, it’s going to have to move to access vegetation and to get water.”

Fricke estimates the dinosaurs probably traveled more than 350 miles (600 kilometers) to nom food and water from the highlands. He says: “They appear to show isotopes from the highlands, but they were found in the basin.”

So now you know.

Dinosaur Teeth Show Big Dinosaurs Trekked For Food is a post from: The Inquisitr

Look! A real souvenir from that creationist museum and their space exhibit.

Dinosaurs in Space is a post from: The Inquisitr

Scientists from Britain and the US have been studying the Tyrannosaurus rex, and made some interesting discoveries about the beast with which all five-year-old boys are obsessed.

Using super-cool computer modeling and three-dimensional laser scans, the team made some new observations and discoveries about the dinosaurs. One of the things the researchers did involved “weighing” specimens, including the Chicago Field Museum’s “Sue.” “Sue” is the largest and most complete T-rex skeleton on display.

In a press release, Peter Makovicky, PhD, curator of dinosaurs at The Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago commented on what was learned about the specimen during study:

“Sue’s vertebrae were compressed by 65 million years of fossilization, which forced a more barrel-chested reconstructio… Nine tons is the minimum estimate we arrived at using a very skinny body form, so even if we made the chest smaller, adding a more realistic amount of flesh would make up for the weight.”

Co-author of the study Dr. Vivian Allen of the Royal Veterinary College spoke of specimen diversity as a barometer of realistic T-rex weight:

“These models range from the severely undernourished through the overly obese, but they are purposely chosen extremes that bound biologically realistic values.”

Sue’s newly estimated body weight was a surprising 30% more than was previously believed, and it’s thought that the massive creature would have weighed in at a scary nine tons. One of the discoveries was that smaller specimens had originally been overestimated size-wise, indicating little T-rexes likely hit a growth spurt between the ages of 10 and 15.

Tyrannosaurus Rex Bigger Than Originally Thought, Probably Scarier is a post from: The Inquisitr

Researchers in southwestern Arkansas recently discovered 120 million-year-old dinosaur footprints and now those dinosaur tracks are being examined.

The fossils were found on private property in an area that covers approximately the size of two football fields. The fossils are particularly exciting because the species found has never before been witnessed in Arkansas.

According to researchers at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, they believed the three-toed print belonged to the Acrocanthosaurus atokensis, one of the largest predators to walk the earth.

Also found on the small patch of area are prints for suaropods, plant-eating dinosaurs with large necks.

Scientists will use the dinosaur tracks to better understand the Early Cretaceous period which occurred from 115 to 120 million years ago.

Brian Platt of the University of Kansas told Fox News:

“Through tracks, we can learn all sorts of things about dinosaur biomechanics and behavior.” Platt went on to add, “Dinosaur bones can be dragged away by animals or swept out to sea. But we know that about 120 million years ago, dinosaurs walked right through here.”

Researchers will continue examining the area and footprints will be excavated and examined to determine more about the dinosaurs that lived in the area and to better understand their environment.

Dinosaur Tracks Found In Arkansas is a post from: The Inquisitr

I get that we need to study and experiment with things in our world but at what point does experimentation cross the line into WTF!

Well I think that line could be this one that has researchers trying to turn back the hands of time with chickens. Scientists have recently found that because chickens and alligators share a common ancestor from way back in some Cretaceous period of time that by using a special protein they can suppress certain genetic signalling processes that control the chicken’s anatomical development.

 Harvard researcher Arhat Abzhanov has been able to alter the development of chicken embryos so that instead of beaks, they grow snouts like alligators. Essentially, this is rewinding evolution, causing the chicken to genetically regress back to when all chickens were actually dinosaurs. With enough tweaking, Abzhanov hopes to eventually hatch one of these out of a modified chicken egg:

via DVICE

Really, do we need to go down this road?

Next up from science we shouldn’t do: Alligator chickens is a post from: The Inquisitr

At the time when the famous Tyrannosaurus rex was roaming the lands of Earth, there was another, lesser-known predator species lurking throughout the world’s oceans, the mosasaur. At one point in the distant past, however, mosasaurs were less-than-fierce land-dwellers.

A new study documented the evolutionary process of the mosasaurs. The findings suggest that, at one point, the mosasaur’s ancestors were land-locked creatures with very limited swimming abilities. Eventually, the creatures evolved into a slim, sea snake-like form more suited for swimming, and from there evolved into a predator of the open seas.

In order to track the evolution of the mososaurs, researchers looked at four different mososaur fossils. One such fossil researchers took at look at was the Dallasaurus, one of the earliest form of the mososaurs that was still largely built for living its life out on land.

To help fill in the gaps of the mososaurs’ evolutionary process, researchers looked at modern animals to help understand how mososaurs evolved from land-dwelling creatures to predators of the seas. Johan Lindgren, lead researcher at Lund University, hypothesizes that the mososaurs developed a two-lobed, crescent tail similar to sharks. The mososaur’s new-and-improved tail, among other improvements, made it a faster and more efficient swimmer.

Fast forward a few million years later, and the mosasaurs were starting to get bigger – up to 56 feet long, researchers suggest. At around the same time the mosasaurs started getting bigger, the smaller (22 feet) ginsu sharks had disappeared from the oceans. There’s no hard evidence to suggest that the mosasaurs were responsible, but the timing makes it a likely scenario.

Along with the majority of dinosaurs, the mosasaurs were wiped out during the Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction event roughly 65.5 million years ago.

Thanks, Christian Science Monitor

Mosasaur: The T-rex of the seas is a post from: The Inquisitr

Because kids’ movies seem to get away with way more depressing shit.

[GraphJam]

[Graph] Grief during ‘The Land Before Time’ over time is a post from: The Inquisitr

I always suspected dinosaurs liked it that way.

[via The Daily What]

Win: Contents of package may shift before delivery is a post from: The Inquisitr

Here’s the picture demonstration

The blog makes no comment in relation to the validity or otherwise of Objective Ministries claims…we just like the pictures.

Pterosaurs and the Bible is a post from: The Inquisitr