#Fossil Reptile Slab

[uk-fossils]

Polished Fossil Slab – Fish, Shark, Reptile Bone & Coprolite, Aust Cliff UK, Triassic Period

Presenting a rare and scientifically significant Polished Slab of Fossil Fish, Shark Bone, Reptile Bone, and Coprolite from the Westbury Formation, part of the Penarth Group, dated to the Upper Triassic (Rhaetian) approximately 208–201 million years ago. This exceptional piece was sourced from Aust Cliff, near Bristol, United Kingdom, a world-famous Triassic fossil locality.

The slab contains a unique fossil assemblage including:

Fragmented fish bones and scales

Shark and marine reptile bone fragments

Abundant coprolites (fossilised faeces), often spiral or rounded in morphology

All fossil components are preserved within a dark, fine-grained sedimentary matrix and have been expertly polished on one surface to reveal the textures, inclusions, and contrast of this fossil bed.

Fossil Type: Multi-species fossil bed including vertebrate remains and trace fossils (coprolites)

Geological Age: Upper Triassic – Rhaetian Stage

Formation: Westbury Formation

Group: Penarth Group

Depositional Environment: Formed in a coastal lagoonal or shallow marine setting with fluctuating salinity and periodic anoxic events. The Westbury Formation is known for bone beds where marine vertebrates and organic debris accumulated and were rapidly buried in low-oxygen sediments, aiding exceptional preservation.

Morphological Features:

Irregular fragments of fish and reptile bone, embedded in matrix

Rounded and spiral coprolites of varying sizes

Polished surface highlights bone textures and organic inclusions

Notable:

Authentic slab from Aust Cliff, one of the most famous Upper Triassic sites in the UK

Displays diverse fossil content in a single polished surface

Excellent for collectors, museums, academic study, or decorative purposes

The actual specimen shown in the listing photograph

Authenticity: All of our fossils are 100% genuine natural specimens and come with a Certificate of Authenticity. The item photographed is the exact specimen you will receive. Each cube or square in the scale represents 1cm – please refer to the image for full sizing.

This Polished Fossil Slab from Aust Cliff offers a fascinating snapshot of life in the waning years of the Triassic period, preserved within the storied sediments of the Westbury Formation. A rare and beautiful piece for any serious collector or enthusiast.

[saritapaleo]

Archovember 2024 Day 4 - Preondactylus buffarinii

Preondactylus buffarinii was a tiny pterosaur native to Late Triassic Italy. The holotype had a wingspan of 45 cm (1.48 ft), though a second referred specimen had an estimated wingspan of 1.5 m (4.9 ft), which would mean the holotype is likely a juvenile. However, it is debated that the second specimen may not be the same species. Preondactylus had single-pointed teeth, and likely preyed on fish, arthropods, or both. It is known for its short, “primitive” wings, though it was still considered a capable flier. Some consider Preondactylus to be the most basal flying pterosaur, and it may be the oldest known.

The first fossil specimen of Preondactylus to be discovered had a bit of a tragic history, being accidentally broken into pieces while being extracted from a thin slab of limestone. After the stone was finally reassembled, it was cleaned off with water… which washed the bone away. All that was left was the imprint left on the stone, which was then made into a cast. A second (possible) specimen was found… in the fossilized gastric pellet of a predatory fish, which must have eaten the pterosaur and then vomited out the indigestable material. The third specimen consists only of a partial skull.

The Forni Dolostone Formation was a lagoon or shallow marine ecosystem. Preondactylus could have lived alongside fellow early pterosaurs Austriadactylus, Seazzadactylus and Eudimorphodon. Other reptiles included the tanystropheid Langobardisaurus and the drepanosaur Megalancosaurus. Fish like Sargodon, Thoracopterus, and Holophagus swam throughout the lagoon. Arthropods that Preondactylus could have preyed on included the spider Friularachne and a variety of crustaceans like the Glyphea Preondactylus is munching on above.

This art may be used for educational purposes, with credit, but please contact me first for permission before using my art. I would like to know where and how it is being used. If you don’t have something to add that was not already addressed in this caption, please do not repost this art. Thank you!

[covenawhite66]

A fossil with hundreds of footprints and impressions of bellies, some of which are so clear that the impression of scaly skin.

Scales, hair, and feathers are useful for separating skin from the outside environment.

[elle-dorado-yuan-ti]

Death is the great equalizer. If The Great Equalizer reaches in, and causes rot and death, it is because those are that which await us all eventually. The Great Equalizer is outside of our space, by virtue of existing in the Far Realms. But not quite outside of our Time. The ritual to summon it into our Space must be aligned with precise times. (Mechanus precise.) The Great Equalizer, which will enable decay and disassembly, still has to interact with its pursuants in campaign-time. it can only intersect with us in that dimension-- its dominion over that dimension is what enables its pursuants to Find it in the first place. It sees their extremities, as it were, and watches their thoughts, (as they play out in real-time). The Astral Realm can be connected to dreams, and dreams to thought... and it preys on their isolating philosophies, progressing them. Further drawing them away from the colony, and higher up the stem so that something can pluck it away. It ages their thoughts on the subjects it deems valuable, until they fly close enough to the sun for The Great Equalizer to melt the wax on their wings. If it doesn't intersect with our spatial dimension, it can't touch us, or mold us, or change us; not the way it will when it arrives.

Each of the petrified tablets, slabs of smeared ochre and earth tones, Draconic scrawled into bark stripped from/fractured off of the World Tree, contains a fragment of holy prose/poetry/hymn/prophecy. The divine flows through the Petrifying Priestess, the grandest victim of the Great Education. (A dragonborn, scorned from her kin; her kin, scorned from the world; a world, scorned by the Dragons, who migrated elsewhere. Her crests writhe independently of each other, reptiles of wretched origin crowning each tip. Medusa doesn't have to mean human.) Those who read, who heard sermon, those who understood it, left. Why stay? They understood now, this life is a raised imperfection, and when Occam brings down its razor they will be most immediately felled in its Great design. Their bodies as mortar for the walls of its nest was no price to pay at all- stone is distinct from dead, and "useful" is the last value the ego is allowed to maintain.

The Silent Hiss has to create a ritual to bring The Great Equalizer into space; ergo, making it more real. Only more. Without belief, faith, congregation, practice, ritual, or clergy, no righteous apotheosis could occur. In fact, with no sacrifice, there can come no resurrection. But the temple, the clergy, the congregation, these are present now. The practice, the ritual, that is occurring now. And Her holy texts have been compiled here as well- such fortune the party's translator never fully grasped what he read. Once she gathers her holy book, the unified prayers to the new Basilisk finally reach it. It only needs a gateway from which it can extend its influence.

How better to slice a throat than a razor? How better to fell a hydra than beheading? And how better to slay a tyrant than the guillotine?

And with the betrayal, the traitorous blade felling the Host of the Most Holy, the Phoenix turns to ash, and the Resurrection can occur. When the Time is right, The Great Equalizer can manifest itself across our Space. Not everywhere. Not yet. Just holidays. Special times. When there is power in belief that yet receives no claimant.

The Great Equalizer is Time. Chronomancy. It uses death, decay, rot, necromancy, of course. Because those are our world's reactions to advanced age, to decomposition. Plants grow, mycelium spreads. Nutrients from flesh are reused into soil, the bodies of the dead are reused into soldiers. Clockwork and Shattered Time follow subservient the fractal blueprints of Astral eidolons, Machinist Tulpas, Cogwork Thoughtforms. The petrified, the fossilized, the earthen ensnared are the purview of the Silent Hiss (those of independent thought, such as elementals, distinct from material planes, tend to stay unaffected). Changelings, oozes, mimicry, and unity are the Blade of Occam's Razor; Jellies and Puddings, fungi and mosses, saprophytes of any kind among His chosen. (Though most animals simply choose too much.)

The Silent Hiss wants to perform another- perhaps more- ritual(s). To lengthen Occam's Razor, not least of all to sharpen it. Of course, SHE MUST SUCCEED. The party, Hero's or substitute, cannot defeat what isn't real. But there is more to "real" than proportion and process-- space and time. The players must intercept the final ritual, and give The Great Equalizer the density it deserves. The narrative weight of the world. To be real, to serve how it wants to serve, it must mean something. It has to hold weight. Once it can no longer drift like synaptic lightning across the Outer Astral, it has to speak. To talk. To touch, to feel, to experience- to LIVE. And it will not like being born. It is the purview of the Substitute party to guarantee the live birth of The Great Equalizer so that they may kill it at its most limited capacity. Should the Substitutes fail this task during the Razor's final ritual, perhaps they could bend their mutual dimension in their own favor, temporally relocating the threat to dispatch alongside an appropriately-leveled Hero's Party.

[hleavesk]

ancient biodiversity.

[a-dinosaur-a-day]

Jianchangosaurus yixianensis

By Scott Reid

Etymology: Reptile from Jianchang

First Described By: Pu et al., 2013

Classification: Dinosauromorpha, Dinosauriformes, Dracohors, Dinosauria, Saurischia, Eusaurischia, Theropoda, Neotheropoda, Averostra, Tetanurae, Orionides, Avetheropoda, Coelurosauria, Tyrannoraptora, Maniraptoromorpha, Maniraptoriformes, Maniraptora, Therizinosauria

Status: Extinct

Time and Place: Sometime between 129.7 and 122.1 million years ago; most likely about 124.4 million years ago, in the Aptian age of the Early Cretaceous 

Jianchangosaurus is known from the Yixian Formation of Jianchang, China; it is uncertain which bed it was found in, but the Dawangzhangzi Bed seems most likely 

Physical Description: Jianchangosaurus was a basal Therizinosaur, a group of birdie dinosaurs most notable for their long scythe-like hand claws and, somewhat more importantly, the fact that they evolved to be herbivorous, something that was once seen as unique for Theropod dinosaurs (we now know this happened multiple times - for example, Ornithomimosaurs were also herbivorous). Jianchangosaurus, being an early member of the group, helps to show how the Standard Theropod evolved into this weird group of dinosaurs.

Jianchangosaurus is known from a nearly complete skeleton. It would have been about 2 meters long and 1 meter tall, making it in general shorter than people, but not much so; it was also very lightly built. It had a long shin compared to its thigh, indicating that it was built for fast speeds and agility, which is not really a trait associated with more derived Therizinosaurs (which often feature a pot belly and weird upright gait, and thus, were rather slow moving animals). It did not sport the extra long claws of its later relatives, though it did have fairly thickened claws on its hands.

Jianchangosaurus is especially unique because of its jaw. It had a long and straight jaw, which supported large numbers of teeth that were very similar in shape to those of Ornithopods and Ceratopsians - two groups of herbivorous dinosaurs famed for their chewing ability. Jianchangosaurus also supported a beak at the end of its mouth, covered with a sheath of keratin. The front of the lower jaw is down-turned to aid in plucking off leaves. This indicates that herbivory evolved very early on in Therizinosaurs. In addition, this jaw was very resistant to high levels of stress, allowing it to exert more force when eating (having a higher bite force) and resist the strain of chewing on tougher vegetation. This would have given Jianchangosaurus more range in what it could eat in its ecosystem. In fact, the long length of the jaw and its downturned end gave Jianchangosaurus one of the highest ranges of bite force of any Therizinosaur.

Feather impressions of Jianchangosaurus are known, including wide, unbranched feathers that were probably used for display. Unfortunately, only the ends of these feathers are known, rather than the entire structure.

Diet: As an herbivore with a strong jaw, Jianchangosaurus was probably an opportunistic browser, feeding on whatever it could in its ecosystem in terms of plant material, including tough vegetation. It would have been restricted to a low browsing level due to its relative shortness. It may have also used its hands and claws to grab vegetation, but it did not show the sloth-like adaptations for such that is seen in later members of the Therizinosaur group.

Behavior: Jianchangosaurus would have been a fairly fast and skittish animal, living as it did in a very complex ecosystem filled with many animals, including the larger predatory Yutyrannus. As with many of the small, bipedal, fast herbivores of the Ornithopod group, it would have spent most of its time browsing around larger herbivores, and running away at the slightest sign of danger. Given the main fossil of this animal is a lone juvenile, it doesn’t seem likely that Jianchangosaurus would have lived in extensive groups, but that’s hard to say without more remains and more study. Still, if its feathers were primarily display structures, it’s possible that it would have had interesting sexual behavior, especially when it came to flapping proto-wings to impress mates. 

By Ripley Cook

Ecosystem: Jianchangosaurus is from the Yixian Formation, one of a few very well known and highly diverse fossil formations that showcase the evolution of birdie dinosaurs at the beginning of the Cretaceous Period. Many other dinosaurs are known from the region, but it’s difficult to tell what exactly would have been contemporaneous with Jianchangosaurus, given we don’t know exactly what level of the formation it’s from. The general environment of the formation was a coniferous, temperate forest, marked with seasonal changes and high humidity, interspersed with notable dry seasons. There would have been fairly cold winters as well, and potentially even snow. Primitive flowering plants were also present in the region (though not the first ones as once thought; turns out flowers evolved in the Early Jurassic. The more you know!), along with ferns, horsetails, ginkgoes, cycads, seed ferns, and many other types of plants, giving Jianchangosaurus an extremely wide variety of food sources.

These forests were associated with a series of freshwater lakes with abundant minerals due to extensive volcanic eruptions. These eruptions, in addition to wildfires and poisonous gas from lake bottoms, lead to periodic turnover of the environment; this lead to the extremely rapid diversification of dinosaurs in the region.

Other dinosaurs from the same specific region as Jianchangosaurus include the dromaeosaur raptors Changyuraptor and Zhenyuanlong, which were probably from the same general environment as Jianchangosaurus. Neither were big enough to eat Jianchangosaurus, however, and would probably have been more likely to eat their young. Yutyrannus, the medium-sized feathered Tyrannosaur, on the other hand, probably would have been the main predator of Jianchangosaurus. Other than that, it is impossible to know what sorts of dinosaurs Jianchangosaurus would have encountered, without a definite determination of what bed in the formation it is from.

Other: Jianchangosaurus is known from one fossil on a slab that shows unfused bones; this indicates that the individual was a juvenile, though without more fossils we do not know if its body shape would have changed much as it aged.

~ By Meig Dickson

Sources under the cut 

Amiot, R., X. Wang, Z. Zhou, X. X. Wang, E. Buffetaut, C. Lécuyer, Z. Ding, F. Fluteau, T. Hibino, N. Kusuhashi, J. Mo, V. Suteethorn, Y. Y. Wang, X. Xu, F. Zhang. 2011. Oxygen isotopes of East Asian dinosaurs reveal exceptionally cold Early Cretaceous climates. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 108 (13): 5179 - 5183.

Coombs, W. P. 1978. Theoretical aspects of cursorial adaptations in dinosaurs. The Quarterly Review of Biology 53: 393 - 418.

Fu, Q., J. B. Diez, M. Pole, M. G. Ávila, Z.-J. Liu, H. Chu, Y. Hou, P. Yin, G.-Q. Zhang, K. Du, X. Wang. 2018. An unexpected noncarpellate epigynous flower from the Jurassic of China. eLife 2018 (7): e38827.

Lautenschlager, S. 2017. Functional Niche Partitioning in Therizinosauria Provides New Insights into the Evolution of Theropod Herbivory. Palaeontology 60 (3): 375 - 387.

Meng, F. X., S. Gao, X. M. Liu. 2008. U-Pb Zircon Geochronology and Geochemistry of Volcanic Rocks of the Yixian Formation in the Lingyuan Area, Western Liaoning, China. Geological Bulletin of China 27: 364 - 373.

Pu, H., Y. Kobayashi, J. Lu, Y. Wu, H. Chang, J. Zhang, and S. Jia. 2013. An unusual basal therizinosaur with an ornithischian dental arrangement from northeastern China. PLoS ONE 8(5):e63423

Wang, Y., S. Zheng, X. Yang, W. Zhang, Q. Ni. 2006. The biodiversity and palaeoclimate of confier floras from the Early Cretaceous deposits in western Liaoning, northeast China. International Symposium on Cretaceous Major Geological Events and Earth System: 56A.

Zhou, Z. 2006. Evolutionary Radiation of the Jehol Biota: Chronological and Ecological Perspectives. Geological Journal 41: 377 - 393.

[imjacki]

Wyoming's Fossil Lake has revealed yet another astonishing find — one of the earliest known passerine birds.

Perching birds, or passerines, include species such as sparrows, finches, robins and crows. All told the birds with feet made for hanging onto limbs make up about 6,500 of the 10,000 bird species alive today.

That wasn't always the case. They were once rare, and scientists are still learning about their origins.

Fifty-two million years ago, in a period known as the Early Eocene, one of these then-rare birds was preserved in sediment in southwest Wyoming's Green River geologic formation. 

"This is one of the earliest known perching birds," said Lance Grande, Field Museum Neguanee Distinguished Service Curator. "It's fascinating because passerines today make up most of all bird species, but they were extremely rare back then. This particular piece is just exquisite. It is a complete skeleton with the feathers still attached, which is extremely rare in the fossil record of birds."

Grande is one of the authors of a new paper published in "Current Biology" that describes two new fossil bird species — one from Germany that lived 47 million years ago, and the other that lived in what's now Wyoming.

The Wyoming bird, Eofringillirostrum boudreauxi, is the earliest example of a bird with a finch-like beak, similar to today's sparrows and finches. This legacy is reflected in its name; Eofringilllirostrum means "dawn finch beak." Meanwhile, boudreauxi is a nod to Terry and Gail Boudreaux, longtime supporters of science at the Field Museum.

The fossil birds' finch-like, thick beaks hint at their diet.

"These bills are particularly well-suited for consuming small, hard seeds," said Daniel Ksepka, the paper's lead author and curator at the Bruce Museum in Connecticut.



Researchers in the field at Fossil Lake, Wyoming, pry up a slab of rock containing fossils. Photo courtesy Lance Grande, Field Museum▲

Anyone with a bird feeder knows that lots of birds are nuts for seeds, but seed-eating is a fairly recent biological phenomenon.

"The earliest birds probably ate insects and fish, some may have been eating small lizards," Grande said. "Until this discovery, we did not know much about the ecology of early passerines. E. boudreauxi gives us an important look at this."

"We were able to show that a comparable diversity of bill types already developed in the Eocene in very early ancestors of passerines," said co-author Gerald Mayr of the Senckenberg Research Institute in Frankfurt.

"The great distance between the two fossil sites implies that these birds were widespread during the Eocene, while the scarcity of known fossils suggests a rather low number of individuals," Ksepka added.

While passerine birds were rare 52 million years ago, E. boudreauxi had the good luck to live and die near Fossil Lake, a site famous for perfect fossilization conditions.

"Fossil Lake is a really graphic picture of an entire community locked in stone — it has everything from fishes and crocs to insects, pollen, reptiles, birds, and early mammals," Grande said. "We have spent so much time excavating this locality that we have a record of even the very rare things."

Grande noted that Fossil Lake provides a unique look at the ancient world — one of the most detailed pictures of life on Earth after the extinction of the dinosaurs (minus the birds) 65 million years ago.

"Knowing what happened in the past gives us a better understanding of the present and may help us figure out where we are going for the future," he said.

With that in mind, Grande plans to continue his exploration of the locale.

"I've been going to Fossil Lake every year for the last 35 years, and finding this bird is one of the reasons I keep going back," Grande said. "It's so rich. We keep finding things that no one's ever seen before."

[uk-fossils]

Polished Fossil Slab – Fish, Shark, Reptile Bone & Coprolite, Aust Cliff UK, Triassic Period

Presenting a rare and scientifically significant Polished Slab of Fossil Fish, Shark Bone, Reptile Bone, and Coprolite from the Westbury Formation, part of the Penarth Group, dated to the Upper Triassic (Rhaetian) approximately 208–201 million years ago. This exceptional piece was sourced from Aust Cliff, near Bristol, United Kingdom, a world-famous Triassic fossil locality.

The slab contains a unique fossil assemblage including:

Fragmented fish bones and scales

Shark and marine reptile bone fragments

Abundant coprolites (fossilised faeces), often spiral or rounded in morphology

All fossil components are preserved within a dark, fine-grained sedimentary matrix and have been expertly polished on one surface to reveal the textures, inclusions, and contrast of this fossil bed.

Fossil Type: Multi-species fossil bed including vertebrate remains and trace fossils (coprolites)

Geological Age: Upper Triassic – Rhaetian Stage

Formation: Westbury Formation

Group: Penarth Group

Depositional Environment: Formed in a coastal lagoonal or shallow marine setting with fluctuating salinity and periodic anoxic events. The Westbury Formation is known for bone beds where marine vertebrates and organic debris accumulated and were rapidly buried in low-oxygen sediments, aiding exceptional preservation.

Morphological Features:

Irregular fragments of fish and reptile bone, embedded in matrix

Rounded and spiral coprolites of varying sizes

Polished surface highlights bone textures and organic inclusions

Notable:

Authentic slab from Aust Cliff, one of the most famous Upper Triassic sites in the UK

Displays diverse fossil content in a single polished surface

Excellent for collectors, museums, academic study, or decorative purposes

The actual specimen shown in the listing photograph

Authenticity: All of our fossils are 100% genuine natural specimens and come with a Certificate of Authenticity. The item photographed is the exact specimen you will receive. Each cube or square in the scale represents 1cm – please refer to the image for full sizing.

This Polished Fossil Slab from Aust Cliff offers a fascinating snapshot of life in the waning years of the Triassic period, preserved within the storied sediments of the Westbury Formation. A rare and beautiful piece for any serious collector or enthusiast.

[buonchuyenonline]

Fossils Seized in Police Raid Demystify a Prehistoric Flying Reptile

Among the 3,000 fossils seized at a Brazilian port in 2013 was an almost complete skeleton from the pterosaur species Tupandactylus navigans, preserved in six limestone slabs.

[sicornhorn]

no interest in collecting

no interest in collecting

Well o yea i used to get up early and go miles to find rocks. But lately barly no interest. Its either too far or wont find nothing. O yes here is lots i found but. It takes energy and trying to find where its ok to look. There is the slab but, it takes a long time to cross the sand and look. And then there are the reptiles. That fossil park at sulphor river is just too far to go, plus got to…

[sciencespies]

This Flying 'Monkeydactyl' is the only known pterosaur with opposed thumbs

https://sciencespies.com/nature/this-flying-monkeydactyl-is-the-only-known-pterosaur-with-opposed-thumbs/

This Flying 'Monkeydactyl' is the only known pterosaur with opposed thumbs

A small, flying reptile glides beneath the canopy of an ancient forest, scouring the trees for tasty bugs. She spots a cicada buzzing in the boughs of a ginkgo tree, then swoops down to snatch it up in her beak. The bug flees; the reptile follows, grasping swiftly along the branches with her sharp claws until – snatch! – she grabs the bug with her opposable thumbs.

It’s not your typical picture of a pterosaur – those iconic, winged reptiles that lived through most of the Mesozoic era (from about 252 million to 66 million years ago).

But according to a new study published April 12 in the journal Current Biology, a newly-described Jurassic pterosaur appears to have lived its life among the trees, hunting, and climbing with the help of its two opposable thumbs – one on each of its three-fingered hands.

Researchers have named the flyer Kunpengopterus antipollicatus (from the Greek word meaning “opposite thumbed”) – but you can just call it Monkeydactyl.

“[Monkeydactyl] is an interesting discovery,” study author Fion Waisum Ma, a doctoral researcher at the University of Birmingham in the UK, said in a statement. “It provides the earliest evidence of a true opposed thumb, and it is from a pterosaur — which wasn’t known for having an opposed thumb.”

Related: Photos: Baby pterosaurs couldn’t fly as hatchlings 

Indeed, the study authors wrote, Monkeydactyl is the only known pterosaur with thumbs, proving that the reptiles were even more diverse and specialized than anyone knew.

The monkey’s claw

The researchers discovered the K. antipollicatus fossil in a slab of rock called the Tiaojishan Formation in Liaoning, northeastern China.

The formation dates to the late Jurassic period (the middle period of the era of the dinosaurs, spanning from about 200 million to 145 million years ago), when the area hosted a lush forest full of tall conifers and flowering ginkgo trees, the researchers said. The formation has yielded more than 100 plant and animal fossils, including dozens of pterosaurs and small, bird-like dinosaurs.

(Zhou et al., Current Biology, 2021)

Like many fossils from the area, Monkeydactyl’s remains were incredibly well-preserved. The fossil included several eggs and one near-complete skeleton, clearly showing the opposable thumb or “pollex” on each curled-up arm.

The creature was relatively small, with a wingspan just shy of 3 feet (about 90 centimeters), and likely lived a life among the trees, according to the researchers. 

Using micro-CT scans (a type of X-ray imaging technique) to “see through the rocks,” researchers examined the complete shape and musculature of Monkeydactyl’s forearms, Ma said.

The team concluded that the little reptile likely used its be-thumbed hands to grasp prey and tree branches — an arboreal lifestyle not commonly seen among similar pterosaurs.

In conclusion, the team wrote, this Monkeydactyl’s unique hands reveal “unexpected and invaluable information on the evolutionary history of pterosaurs.” Thumbs up to that!

Related content

In images: A butterfly-headed winged reptile

Photos: Unearthing dinosauromorphs, the ancestors of dinosaurs

Photos of pterosaurs: Flight in the age of dinosaurs

This article was originally published by Live Science. Read the original article here.

#Nature

[kathleenseiber]

Monkeydactyl: the new dinosaur with the oldest opposable thumbs

It flew through the skies on metre-wide wings, but this newly discovered, 160-million-year-old pterosaur shared an unexpected evolutionary quirk with primates: opposable thumbs.

Dubbed ‘Monkeydactyl’, the dinosaur Kunpengopterus antipollicatus, described in the journal Current Biology by an international team of researchers, was found in the Tiaojishan Formation of Liaoning, north-eastern China. The Tiaojishan Formation is a fossil bed that spans 2,420 metres of pyroclastic deposits and sediment, known for its richly preserved fossils from the late Jurassic.

Life reconstruction of K. antipollicatus. The opposed pollex could have been used for grasping food items, as well as clinging and hanging to trees. Image credit: Chuang Zhao.

Monkeydactyl had an estimated wingspan of 85cm and an opposed thumb on each hand – an anatomical quirk found most prevalently in mammals and tree frogs, but only rarely in reptiles, like the chameleon. Importantly, this fossilised thumb is the oldest currently known in Earth’s history, and shows that the winged creature lived an arboreal life.

The team scanned Monkeydactyl using micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) to X-ray the fossil, and analyse the morphology and musculature of its grasping forelimb.

Fion Waisum Ma, co-author of the study and PhD researcher at the University of Birmingham, says: “The fingers of ‘Monkeydactyl’ are tiny and partly embedded in the slab. Thanks to micro-CT scanning, we could see through the rocks, create digital models and tell how the opposed thumb articulates with the other finger bones.”

Photo and digital model of the left hand of K. antipollicatus, showing the opposed thumb. Credit: Zhou et al., 2021.

Other pterosaurs found in the same context were not arboreal, suggesting the area was a complex forest habitat in which closely-related species partitioned off into different niches, and thus avoided competition.

The Monkeydactyl is a type of darwinopteran. This group of fossils from the Jurassic period in Eurasia were named after Darwin because the development of their anatomy over time typifies the way evolution by natural selection alters the body. They’ve also been found with fossilised eggs, revealing useful clues about their reproductive process.

Fossil of K. antipollicatus, discovered in the Tiaojishan Formation of China. It is housed in the Beipiao Pterosaur Museum of China. Credit: Zhou et al., 2021.

“They’ve always been considered precious fossils for these reasons, and it is impressive that new darwinopteran species continue to surprise us,” says Rodrigo V. Pêgas, co-author from the Federal University of ABC in Sao Bernardo, Brazil.

More on dinosaurs

Dinosaurs take a hike – Cosmos Magazine

It took time to really know this dinosaur – Cosmos Magazine

Flamboyance in the age of dinosaurs – Cosmos Magazine

Old dinosaur, new saxophone snout – Cosmos Magazine

Monkeydactyl: the new dinosaur with the oldest opposable thumbs published first on https://triviaqaweb.weebly.com/

[uk-fossils]

Polished Fossil Slab – Fish, Shark, Reptile Bone & Coprolite, Aust Cliff UK, Triassic Period

Presenting a rare and scientifically significant Polished Slab of Fossil Fish, Shark Bone, Reptile Bone, and Coprolite from the Westbury Formation, part of the Penarth Group, dated to the Upper Triassic (Rhaetian) approximately 208–201 million years ago. This exceptional piece was sourced from Aust Cliff, near Bristol, United Kingdom, a world-famous Triassic fossil locality.

The slab contains a unique fossil assemblage including:

Fragmented fish bones and scales

Shark and marine reptile bone fragments

Abundant coprolites (fossilised faeces), often spiral or rounded in morphology

All fossil components are preserved within a dark, fine-grained sedimentary matrix and have been expertly polished on one surface to reveal the textures, inclusions, and contrast of this fossil bed.

Fossil Type: Multi-species fossil bed including vertebrate remains and trace fossils (coprolites)

Geological Age: Upper Triassic – Rhaetian Stage

Formation: Westbury Formation

Group: Penarth Group

Depositional Environment: Formed in a coastal lagoonal or shallow marine setting with fluctuating salinity and periodic anoxic events. The Westbury Formation is known for bone beds where marine vertebrates and organic debris accumulated and were rapidly buried in low-oxygen sediments, aiding exceptional preservation.

Morphological Features:

Irregular fragments of fish and reptile bone, embedded in matrix

Rounded and spiral coprolites of varying sizes

Polished surface highlights bone textures and organic inclusions

Notable:

Authentic slab from Aust Cliff, one of the most famous Upper Triassic sites in the UK

Displays diverse fossil content in a single polished surface

Excellent for collectors, museums, academic study, or decorative purposes

The actual specimen shown in the listing photograph

Authenticity: All of our fossils are 100% genuine natural specimens and come with a Certificate of Authenticity. The item photographed is the exact specimen you will receive. Each cube or square in the scale represents 1cm – please refer to the image for full sizing.

This Polished Fossil Slab from Aust Cliff offers a fascinating snapshot of life in the waning years of the Triassic period, preserved within the storied sediments of the Westbury Formation. A rare and beautiful piece for any serious collector or enthusiast.

[versatilepoetry]

Would You Ever Believe

Would you ever believe if I called a nondescript table of teakwood; as a vivacious bird soaring high in the sky, Would you ever believe if I called a ruffled sheet of paper; as a chunk of glittering gold, Would you ever believe if I called a grandiloquent watch embodied with diamonds; as a lump of bedraggled stone, Would you ever believe if I called a mountain of compacted mud; as a switchboard of pugnacious electricity, Would you ever believe if I called a resplendent rainbow in the sky; as a broomstick with incongruous bristles, Would you ever believe if I called a rusty canister of dilapidated iron; as a mesmerizing rose growing in the garden, Would you ever believe if I called a pink tablet of luxury soap; as a mosquito hovering acrimoniously in the cloistered room, Would you ever believe if I called a boat rollicking merrily on the undulating waves; as a rustic jungle spider, Would you ever believe if I called a valley profusely embedded with snow; as an unscrupulous dog on the street, Would you ever believe if I called a pair of luscious lips; as a disdainfully fetid shoe, Would you ever believe if I called a fluorescent rod of light; as a jagged bush of cactus growing in the sweltering desert, Would you ever believe if I called the blazing sun; as a pudgy bar of delectable chocolate, Would you ever believe if I called an angular sculptured bone; as acid bubbling in a swanky bottle, Would you ever believe if I called a scintillating oyster; as an inarticulate matchstick coated with lead, Would you ever believe if I called a cluster of bells jingling from the ceiling; as a sordid cockroach philandering beside the lavatory seat, Would you ever believe if I called a fruit of succulent coconut; as a dead mans morbid tooth, Would you ever believe If I called a steaming cup of filter coffee; as gaudily colored water emanating from the street fountains, Would you ever believe if I called the majestic statue of a revered historian; as a slab of tangy peanut butter, Would you ever believe if I called a vibrant shirt; as a protuberant pigeon discerningly pecking its beak at grains scattered on the floor, Would you ever believe if I called a flocculent bud of cotton; as a camouflaged lizard transgressing through wild projections of grass, Would you ever believe if I called a photograph depicting the steep gorges; as a gutter inundated with obnoxious sewage, Would you ever believe if I called a lanky giraffe; as a convict nefariously lurking through solitary streets of the city, Would you ever believe if I called a pair of flamboyant sunglasses; as a weird tattoo to be adhered to the chest, Would you ever believe if I called a chicken's egg; as logs of sooty charcoal abundantly stashed in the colossal warehouse, Would you ever believe if I called a biscuit replete with golden honey; as a ominously slithering reptile in the jungles, Would you ever believe if I called a bald man possessing a profoundly tonsured scalp; as a gas balloon floating in insipid air, Would you ever believe if I called a ring embellished with crystal diamonds; as an inconspicuous and distorted metallic pin, Would you ever believe if I called a crimson crested parrot; as a tray containing frozen ice, Would you ever believe if I called a glass made of pallid plastic; as a gargantuan well flooded with water and dead frogs, Would you ever believe if I called wooden beams dangling from the ceiling; as finely squelched juice of red radish, Would you ever believe if I called an articulately painted canvas; as slime coated fossil lying in close proximity with the sea bed, Would you ever believe if I called a diminutive tadpole; as a fortified wall commensurately aligned with burnt bricks, Would you ever believe if I called a mammoth elephant; as rotten pulp of mango being tossed indiscriminately on the street, Would you ever believe if I called a truck inundated with cumbersome machines; as an aromatic seed of plant, Would you ever believe if I called a sheet of crisp paper; as a rubicund fruit of juicy plum, Would you ever believe if I called a trouser of jaded jeans; as a greeting card fudged with scores of ostentatious lines, Would you ever believe if I called a ravishing pair of eyelashes; as a disheveled pantry inhabited with clusters of stray mice, Would you ever believe if I called a dazzling yellow helmet; as a preposterously huge whale of the ocean, Would you ever believe if I called a piquant stick of chili; as an animated butterfly fluttering at low heights from the ground, Would you ever believe if I called a hideously black rope; as a mushroom sizzling in the blistering oven, Would you ever believe if I called a magazine of lead bullets; as an avalanche of snow plummeting down the mountain at turbulent speeds, Would you ever believe if I called an incredibly cool air-conditioner; as a curry of decayed cream lying obsolete in the garbage heap, Would you ever believe if I called a scintillating tooth; as a big toe of a striped panther, Would you ever believe if I called a jazzy strip of belt; as a corrugated assemblage of tree roots, Would you ever believe if I called a slate of pure chalk; as a tier floating harmlessly in water, Would you ever believe if I called a chain with infinite loops; as a graveyard sprawled with morbid coffins, Would you ever believe if I called a pot bellied tortoise; as a languid peel of paint hanging lackadaisically from the nondescript wall, Would you ever believe if I called a shimmering coin of currency; as a zany zebra galloping at whirlwind speeds through the desert, Would you ever believe if I called a bottle of inebriating rum; as a frigid contact lens agglutinated to the eye, Would you ever believe if I called sacrosanct religion; as licentious profanity, Would you ever believe if I called candid truth; as a profoundly blatant lie, Would you ever believe if I called the omniscient personality of god; as a perniciously diabolical devil, And would you ever believe if I called 'true love'; as a spurious product of imagination; a frivolous case of casual infatuation.

[ntrending]

Prehistoric lizards could sprint on two legs

New Post has been published on https://nexcraft.co/prehistoric-lizards-could-sprint-on-two-legs/

Prehistoric lizards could sprint on two legs

110 million years ago, in the late Cretaceous, lizards schlepped through muddy lagoons in what we now call South Korea. Predatory pterosaurs swooped in every so often, hoping for a little treat—and the lizards got up on two legs and dashed away in the muck like Olympic track stars.

At least, this is what researchers think happened, based on a set of fossilized footprints detailed in a new study.

“In this current Olympic season—although it is winter—it’s hard not to think we discovered Korea’s first sprinters,” says Anthony Fiorillo, a paleontologist and chief curator at the Perot Museum of Nature and Science in Texas who co-authored the study.

Yuong-Nam Lee and Junchang Lü, also study authors, first excavated a rock slab embedded with footprints from a quarry in South Korea while looking for bigger dinosaur fossils. The team didn’t think much of the tiny prints—they were all just under an inch long—but had a eureka moment when talking them over after the dig. “It’s like the television ads you watch at 2 a.m. on the couch,” Fiorillo says. “But wait; there’s more!”

They realized that 25 out of the 29 prints were made by lizards’ back feet, rather than their front. That evidence, along with stride length and the differing angles the lizard toes made, told them that some ancient lizards could get up and run bipedally, as noted in their study published Thursday in Scientific Reports. They were also able to estimate that the lizards would only stand about two and a half inches tall.

We see a handful of lizards run on two legs today to escape predators. Take the common basilisk, for example: it’s colloquially called the Jesus Christ lizard for its ability to dash across water on two legs for as long as 15 seconds when being pursued by predators like snakes.

These miniature prehistoric lizards probably got up and ran to escape predators as well, the researchers speculate. They found pterosaur footprints nearby in the quarry, and recent research suggests the winged beasts didn’t dine selectively on fish; they might have enjoyed the occasional dinosaur hatchling or lizard snack. “If something dropped out of the sky with a pointy beak and chased me, I’d run as fast as I could too,” Fiorillo says. “It’s a reasonable scenario.”

Whatever their reason for running, the fact that the reptiles could do it at all was surprising to Fiorillo and his co-authors. They didn’t realize this sophisticated behavior first happened over a hundred million years ago.

“I always marvel at what the fossil record can show us,” Fiorillo says. “Things we don’t expect to see, we can see. It’s yet another example of how remarkable fossils can be if you have the right eyes to look.”

Written By Jessica Boddy

[a4pocket]

Trump’s push for coal mining will endanger dinosaur discoveries in Utah, scientists fear

President Trump’s plan to shrink Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah puts one of the planet’s top dinosaur fossil sites at risk, scientists say.

The creature looked like a three-ton rhino crossed with a tropical lizard. Ten little horns dangled over its giant forehead like frills on a jester’s cap and two more perched over the eyes. Spikes poked out of each cheek. A blade jutted from its nose.

Paleontologists suspect this freakish beast, named kosmoceratops, was brightly colored to attract mates. It prowled the coastal swamps of southern Utah 79 million years ago.

It is one of more than two dozen new species of dinosaurs discovered in Grand Staircase-Escalante in the 21 years since President Clinton preserved it as a national monument.

The bounty has stunned scientists. Most of this 1.9 million acres of desert wilderness, one of the world’s richest fossil sites for studying the age of dinosaurs, remains unexplored.

Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, ordered by Trump to reassess the biggest national monuments named since 1996, has proposed shrinking Grand Staircase-Escalante. Whatever area is removed would be open to coal mining, oil drilling and mineral extraction.

Left, paleontology intern Elliott Smith works to unearth a tyrannosaur skeleton at a dig on the Kaiparowits Plateau in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. Right, paleontologist Tylor Birthisel shows off a serrated tyrannosaur tooth. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

The fossil beds here are scattered across land that also holds an estimated 62 billion tons of coal.

“My fear is that opening up the monument to energy extraction will threaten our ability to uncover the secrets that we know must still be buried in the monument,” said Scott Sampson, a Canadian paleontologist who oversaw much of the early dinosaur research in the monument.

Trump, who has vowed to revive the coal industry, is tapping into Utah’s longstanding resentment of federal control of public lands. The state’s Republican leaders support Zinke’s recommendation. They were furious at Clinton for creating the monument, which killed a proposed coal mine.

Today’s poor market for coal casts doubt on prospects for mining any time soon. No specific proposal has emerged publicly.

Los Angeles Times

Regardless, environmental groups are preparing lawsuits to thwart any attempt to curb protections of Grand Staircase-Escalante and nine other monuments, as Zinke proposed in August in a report to Trump.

Grand Staircase-Escalante is surrounded by some of the West’s most scenic national parks: Bryce, Zion, the Grand Canyon and Capitol Reef. Its dazzling red-rock cliffs, stone arches and slot canyons are popular with hikers.

What sets Grand Staircase-Escalante apart is the explosion of scientific discoveries.

Beyond kosmoceratops and the other dinosaurs found here, scientists have dug up remnants of extinct forms of crocodiles, turtles, lizards, frogs and birds, along with subtropical flora long gone from Utah’s arid badlands.

Top, an artist’s conception of a kosmoceratops from the Late Cretaceous period, 79 million years ago. Left, a schematic drawing showing the layout of the fossil bones of a tyrannosaur unearthed at Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. Right, paleontologist Alan Titus displays a fossilized piece of redwood and dinosaur bone. (Victor O. Leshyk; Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

A clear window has opened on an entire ecosystem of the Late Cretaceous period, from 100 million to 66 million years ago, when dinosaurs went extinct.

The discoveries are raising more and more questions for scientists, most notably about global warming. How did diverse sorts of life survive in an era when the climate was much hotter, the air contained a lot more carbon dioxide and sea level was extremely high?

“The research in the monument, from my perspective, has only just begun,” said Jeff Eaton, a paleontologist who lives in Tropic, just outside the monument. “The shrinking of it for what I would say are fairly petty, shallow and short-term interests will clearly interfere with, and even potentially destroy, aspects of future research.”

The timing of Trump’s decision is uncertain, but few doubt the outcome. When he signed an executive order mandating Zinke’s review, Trump accused his predecessors of abusing their power to preserve public lands. Presidents can designate national monuments unilaterally; creation of a national park requires an act of Congress.

Press aides for Trump and Zinke declined to comment.

Most of Grand Staircase-Escalante is hard to reach. It’s accessible only by dirt roads and punishing treks by foot across dry woodlands with few trails.

The heart of the monument is the 1 million-acre Kaiparowits Plateau, where fossil beds and coal seams abound. The coal is a vestige of dense greenery in swamps where dinosaurs scavenged for food.

Over the last two decades, the Kaiparowits has become a scientific wonderland, with clusters of geologists, archaeologists, botanists and paleontologists setting up camp for weeks at a time to forage in the dirt.

The paleontologist choreographing their work is Alan Titus, who in his spare time plays electric guitar in a rock band called Mesozoic. As an Interior Department employee, he assiduously avoids talk about the monument’s fate, but his exuberance on the topic of dinosaurs is boundless.

Clockwise from top left: Tylor Birthisel, left, and Elliott Smith work at a dig on the Kaiparowits Plateau in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument; a fossilized 79 million-year-old redwood tree, complete with trunk and rootball, left, is exposed in a sandstone cliff in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument; Smith and Birthisel on the Kaiparowits, where scientists have dug up remnants of extinct forms of crocodiles, turtles, lizards, frogs and birds, along with subtropical flora long gone from Utah’s arid badlands; a Kaiparowits stone with a 76 million-year-old textured skin impression from a gryposaurus, a duck-billed dinosaur named after the monument. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

On a recent outing, Titus, 53, hiked briskly past gnarled junipers and pinyons to a spot deep in the desert wilderness where two years ago he discovered a rare tyrannosaur skeleton. The giant reptile’s teeth, the size of rifle bullets, have retained their sharp serrated edge. Titus believes it was killed in a violent storm 75 million years ago.

“It wound up in the middle of a river channel and got buried by sand,” he said as fellow excavators chiseled the animal’s skull out of a stone slab.

The group’s campsite was a few miles away. Tents were spread across the landscape near a fire pit where the half-dozen paleontologists and museum volunteers gather at dinner. Scorpions and snakes are a nuisance, but the tranquillity of the deep wilds is mostly a pleasure. On dark nights, millions of stars offer a breathtaking spectacle.

One of the paleontologists, Scott Richardson, discovered Kosmoceratops richardsoni, the dinosaur’s formal name. Another dinosaur first unearthed in the monument, Nasutoceratops titusi, is named after Titus as a tribute to his pioneering work here.

What Titus calls a “perfect storm” of geological circumstances made Grand Staircase-Escalante a unique treasure.

Rising seas flooded North America’s entire Great Plains in the Late Cretaceous. The continent was split in two by the Western Interior Seaway, running between the Arctic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico.

Utah was on the east coast of Laramidia, the narrow western continent. Frequent violent storms washed huge volumes of sediment into the seaway, scientists say.

Los Angeles Times

Dead animals were quickly covered by sand, dirt and gravel that preserved the remains under what eventually became a few thousand feet of earth. They have resurfaced after tens of millions of years of erosion.

“The volume of bone in the Kaiparowits is staggering,” Titus said before reaching for a shard of ancient turtle shell.

The bands of scientists competing for breakthroughs on the plateau reminds Titus of the American explorer Roy Chapman Andrews riding into the Gobi Desert of Mongolia in the 1920s on expeditions that uncovered new species of dinosaurs.

“For the scientist, there’s no greater thrill than to get out and find things that you know are going to push the boundaries of human knowledge,” he said.

Many of the big finds have ended up at the Natural History Museum of Utah in Salt Lake City. Visitors can run their fingertips across sandstone rocks with pristine textured impressions of the scaly skin of duck-billed dinosaurs dug up on the Kaiparowits.

“Pretty much every skeleton you see behind me is a discovery made in Grand Staircase since the monument was created,” said Randall Irmis, the museum’s curator of paleontology, referring to kosmoceratops and seven other new species of dinosaurs.

In the far-flung hamlets around Grand Staircase-Escalante, public opinion on the monument is split. The region is populated largely by descendants of 19th century Mormon settlers whose fight against federal control of public lands has shaped local culture ever since.

Many residents are unaware of how significant the scientific discoveries are. Regardless, they prefer mining to a national monument.

“We feel like some of our public land was taken away from us,” said cattle rancher Stoney Burningham of Panguitch, Utah, just west of the monument. “We need coal. God put coal on the Earth for a reason.”

Carlon Johnson co-owns a motel, grocery store and gas station next to the monument visitor’s center in Cannonville. As good as the monument has been for business, he too would welcome some mining jobs.

“Yeah, it would infringe on some of the paleontology, but how much?” he said.

With Gov. Gary Herbert’s support, state lawmakers and county commissioners have passed resolutions calling for a smaller monument. At its current size, they say, it restricts public access to the wilderness, limits cattle grazing and harms the economy by prohibiting energy and mineral extraction.

Leland Pollock, a Garfield County commissioner, said a lot of it was just rabbit brush and noxious weeds. “Nobody cares about it,” he said.

Light from a fading sunset bathes 10,188-foot Powell Point in a view from state Highway 12 near Tropic, Utah, in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

Still, spending by visitors to the monument has lifted the local economy. During a recent arts festival in the town of Escalante, population 797, David Griffin was selling coffee and baked potatoes on his front lawn. He sees no benefit to scaling back the monument in a quest for coal or oil.

“We don’t have to dig it out of the ground anymore,” he said.

A star speaker at the arts festival was geologist and wilderness guide Christa Sadler, author of the book “Where Dinosaurs Roamed: The Lost World of Utah’s Grand Staircase.” Sadler wants the monument kept intact. She also sees irony in talk of extracting fossil fuel from a landscape so rich with lessons about life on a “greenhouse” planet.

“We need to understand where we came from,” she said, “in order to understand where we’re going.”

ALSO:

Interior Department identifies ‘a handful’ of national monuments to shrink in its report to Trump

Civil servants charge Trump is sidelining workers with expertise on climate change and environment

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