Hi Dino Gang,
Hope you’ve been enjoying the Spring weather and blossoming plants!
I can’t wait to get back into gardening; I’ve accumulated a ton of seeds last year so I’m pretty excited to open those up and grow some potatoes, corn, and beans.
March has been quite a busy month for me. I’m in the process of moving so I’ve been doing a whole lot of spring cleaning to prepare. Selling stuff I don’t need, fixing what’s broken, and getting things in order has been a lot of work, but pretty satisfying to make the move more seamless.
Yet the most special part of this month has been all the book signings across North Carolina! When I set up these book signings, I had no idea if people would even show up, but each event blew my expectations out of the water! Getting to see so many people from the Dino Gang in person, talk about all things dinosaurs, and even take some pictures has been such an awesome experience. You all are such amazing people and I'm so thankful to have met you!
I've got more book signings planned for the future so be on the lookout for those dates on social media. But if you live outside of North Carolina, I didn't forget about you! If you go to the exclusive link below, you can grab your own signed copy plus a random Pokémon card that was opened on my previous live stream! I only have seven cards left so secure your signed copy and card before it’s too late!
Grab your signed copy and Pokémon card here!
In this month’s Dino Digest, you’ll find:
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A baby burrowing dinosaur
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A dwarf dinosaur that lived on tropical islands
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A relative of Triceratops with a giant frill
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And monsoons that lasted for half a million years
So scroll on, because if you thought you knew how dinosaurs lived, adapted, and evolved… think again. 👇
This new dinosaur was way smaller than it should have been. Kryptohadros is a new duck-billed dinosaur that lived in Romania roughly 66 million years ago, making it one of the last dinosaurs to exist. What made this dinosaur so interesting was that it was roughly the size of a pony, which is much smaller than most duck-billed dinosaurs. In fact, all of its other relatives in Romania at the time were also extremely small, suggesting these dinosaurs experience insular dwarfism. At the time, Romania was a chain of islands, which forced animals to evolve small sizes and adapt to limited resources. Furthermore, the distant relatives of Kryptohadros actually migrated to Romania from Asia and were originally much bigger.
Paleontologists may have just found the cutest dinosaur ever! Doolysaurus is a brand new species of dinosaur that lived in South Korea roughly 100 million years ago. This cat-sized dinosaur belonged to the group of dinosaurs known as Thescelosaurs. These two legged plant eaters commonly had strong arms and legs just like modern burrowing animals like armadillos. We’ve even found some Thescelosaurs that have been found huddled together inside a burrow. Therefore, it’s suggested that dinosaurs like Doolysaurus burrowed underground with their family away from large predators.
This new dinosaur gets at a fundamental problem in paleontology: when do we consider a fossil a unique species? Cryptarcus is a new species that was originally thought to be the horned dinosaur Chasmosaurus russelli, but why did it change to a new species? When this skeleton was originally found, it was lumped in with the species Chasmosaurus because it also had a large rectangular frill. At first, this was thought to be a unique feature, but after several other dinosaurs were discovered, we realized large rectangular frills were actually quite common and not a defining feature. So this prompted paleontologists to go back to the drawing board and after a second look, they realized that Cryptarcus had many unique features not seen in any Chasmosaurus skeleton. Overall, this new dinosaur points to an important aspect of paleontology: it’s always important to check old work after new discoveries are made.
This new dinosaur was found in a place that we were not expecting! Gongshuilong is a new duck-billed dinosaur that lived in China 70 million years ago. This duck-billed dinosaur belonged to the Brachylophosaurs, who had big noses sporting a paddle-like crest. But what’s interesting is that these duck-billed dinosaurs were predominately found in North America, with Gongshuilong being one of the first. Therefore, the authors suggest that these types of dinosaur originated in Asia and then migrated to North America where they became common. Back then, the Bering land bridge connecting Asia and North America would have been open, so this migration idea is not that far-fetched.
A new study reveals that it rained for half a million years straight during the Cretaceous! Around 100-90 million years ago, Earth reached some of its hottest temperatures in all of history. However the consequences of this intense climate change haven't been fully known until now. The isotopic signature in Chinese rocks were analyzed in order to understand the annual humidity and amount of rainfall. What they found was that China during this extremely hot time was also unusually humid. What's more, they found that the region experienced roughly 6.5 ft (2 m) of rainfall each year for 500,000 years straight.
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Q: Did dinosaurs migrate?
A: We don’t have any evidence that dinosaurs migrated so we don’t know for sure. However, some plant eating dinosaurs were known to travel in large herds. Also, some dinosaurs were known to have a massive range. Edmontosaurus for example is known to live in herds and has been found all the way from western North America, up to Canada, and even into Alaska! It may be that some dinosaurs like these migrated based on the seasons just like modern animals.
Q: How big is dinosaur poop?
A: Not as big as that scene in Jurassic Park! Most coprolites (fossilized poop) are actually surprisingly small; most could fit in your hand. However the Guinness World Record for the biggest coprolite ever discovered was laid by a T. rex and was 2 feet long and 6 inches wide!
Q: What's the deepest hole you've dug?
A: The deepest I’ve ever dug for a dinosaur was back in 2020 in New Mexico. The layer we wanted to dig in was essentially at the base of a cliff. Rather than find another place to dig, we decided to dig through the cliff! By the time we were done digging, we could stack four grad students on top of each other; This was probably about 24 feet.
New Fossils from Antarctica Rewrite the Origin of Modern Birds
Watch the full video now 👆🏻
THANKS FOR BEING A PART OF THE DINO GANG,
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