Hi Dino Gang,
This month’s newsletter + research findings are next-level.
Some truly wild new dinosaurs have just been discovered and mind-blowing new studies published, including Troodon becoming a valid species again 👀 Plus, new research is revealing how ancient predators evolved and trust me, it’s going to reshape your understanding of the Late Cretaceous.
We also dropped an epic YouTube collab with Unexpected Dino Lesson on Spinosaurus, you don’t want to miss it. And inside my membership, Daily Dino Direct, I sat down with Dr. Eugenia Gold, a paleontologist and expert in avian neuroanatomy and science communication, for a masterclass that blew our members away.
In fact, it was so good, I’m running another secret sale for subscribers only: you can join Daily Dino Direct for just $1 to experience this conversation for yourself but only until Sunday at midnight. Come see why our members couldn’t stop talking about it.
I can't wait to see you inside! Now let’s dive into the good stuff👇
A new dinosaur was discovered and it was one of the earliest dinosaurs to exist! Maleriraptor was a carnivorous dinosaur that lived in India 220 million years ago. This 9 foot (3 meter) long predator could run up to 34 - 36 mph (54 - 58 km/h) and had powerful jaws that could deliver a bite force of nearly 2,000 Newtons. During the Triassic period, when Maleriraptor was alive, dinosaurs were still a new type of animal and competed with many other prehistoric reptiles. But after a climate disaster that saw the extinction of many animals, dinosaurs began to fill in the spots that these animals left. This allowed dinosaurs like Maleriraptor to become bigger, faster, stronger, and way more diverse, which helped kick start their dominance.
A new dinosaur was discovered and it had a really strange tail! Zhongyuansaurus junchangi is a new armored dinosaur that lived in China 113 million years ago. It was the second species of Zhongyuansaurus to be found and was roughly 15 feet (5 meters long). What makes this dinosaur so strange is that it was a relative of Ankylosaurus. But unlike its relative, Zhongyuansaurus junchangi didn’t have a club tail. Instead, it had a stiff tail covered in tiny bony bumps called osteoderms to make it appear like a mace. While it wasn’t as big, you still wouldn’t have wanted to be on the business end of that tail!
A new dinosaur was discovered and it was one of the first giant dinosaurs! Jinchuanloong is a new long-necked dinosaur that lived in China 168 million years ago. This Sauropod was roughly 33 foot (10 meter) long and roamed what used to be a freshwater lake. This dinosaur is special because it was one of the earliest Sauropods to walk on four legs. Up until this point, many Sauropods didn’t have the iconic body style that we all recognize. These early species walked on two legs and had relatively short necks. But Jinchuanloong is one of the first species to develop the long neck and tail, pillar-like legs, and four-legged stance. This unique body would have helped it reach into the highest trees and deter smaller predators from attacking.
This dinosaur is shaping up to be more controversial than Spinosaurus! Back in the 1850’s some unusual dinosaur teeth were found and were named as Troodon. This dinosaur is thought to be similar to raptors, like Velociraptor, except they were slimmer and had large serrations on their teeth (Similar to steak knives). But naming dinosaurs solely based on teeth is a big problem since dinosaur teeth look the same among closely related species. Paleontologists in the late 2010’s realized the teeth of Troodon were not that unique and so lumped it together with Stenonychosaurus. However, scientists have just found a full skeleton that has the exact teeth of Troodon, but a unique enough skeleton to warrant it still being a distinct species!
T. rex is one of the most iconic dinosaurs to ever exist. But, where did T. rex come from and what caused this dinosaur to evolve? To answer these questions, paleontologists looked at the family tree of T. rex and tested if body size increased as the climate changed. They found that there was no ideal temperature for Tyrannosaur evolution, but they found that Tyrannosaurs increased in size after short term cooling periods. They also found that T. rex was also the descendant of immigrants; The ancestors of T. rex actually originated in Asia and crossed the Bering straight between Russia and Alaska before settling in North America.
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Q: How many species of dinosaurs are there?
A: There’s so many species that have been found, we can’t even really count them all! I’d probably estimate that there’s anywhere from two to five thousand species that have been officially described. It’s hard to know the exact number of dinosaurs that have been discovered because we’re still finding new species every month. Just in 2024 alone, there have been over 50 new species discovered. If 50 new species have been discovered every year for the past 200 years, then that estimate may be upwards of 10,000 species! But there also isn’t a running list of every species so we can’t know for sure. But we can say that there were a lot of dinosaurs that existed!
Q: What was your favorite dinosaur to excavate?
A: My favorite dinosaur to excavate was a small burrowing dinosaur called Fona. It was about the size of a Great Dane so it was just big enough to allow multiple people to work on it at the same time. It was partially complete which made it exciting to find a ton of fossils to dig up. But the coolest part was that at the time, this was a brand new species of dinosaur so me and the North Carolina Museum team were some of the first people to ever know about this dinosaur!
Q: How do you know something is a new species of dinosaurs from just a few fossil fragments?
A: It takes a lot of comparison between other fossils to know whether the one you’ve found is truly unique from all the other fossils found so far. We’ve come a long way and we are getting more and more certain thanks to computers and coding. But realistically it all depends on how good the paleontologist is and how complete the fossil is. It requires a lot of work and verification to make sure the fragmentary fossil you have truly is different from other fragmentary fossils. The more complete the skeleton, the more skeletons you have of that dinosaur, and how many other skeletons you compare it to increases how likely it is a unique dinosaur.
🦖 Could Spinosaurus actually swim... or is it all just prehistoric hype? In this video, I team up with Unexpected Dino Lesson to break down one of the biggest debates in paleontology — was Spinosaurus aegyptiacus a fully aquatic dinosaur, or just a clumsy wader with a weird body? From its paddle-like tail, dense bones, and crocodile-like skull, to arguments about drag, body stiffness, and fossil locations, we’ll explore both sides of this epic scientific showdown.
THANKS FOR BEING A PART OF THE DINO GANG,
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