#Mid-Cretaceous

[savage-kult-of-gorthaur]

"..."SHARK-TOOTHED LIZARD," AN ALLOSAURID THEROPOD FROM MID-CRETACEOUS NORTH AFRICA."

PIC(S) INFO: Spotlight on the original painting and published cover art to "Prehistoric Times" Magazine #86 (Summer 2008), artwork by William Stout, featuring a Carcharodontosaurus “shark-toothed lizard”, an allosaurid theropod from mid-Cretaceous North Africa.

EXTRA INFO: Carcharodontosaurus is a representative of a family of dinosaurs that may well turn out to be the largest meat-eating dinosaurs of all.

Resolution at 876x1157 & 810x1048.

Sources: www.illustrationhistory.org/artists/william-stout & https://blog.everythingdinosaur.com/blog/_archives/2008/07/21/3803292.html.

[etchif]

[st4rrmii]

This isn't targeted at anyone in specific, in fact most of the fanartists in the fandom do not have this issue, which I love and am so relieved to see, but please, for the love of god, draw Sammy plus/mid size.

Sammy is some of the only plus/mid sized rep I've seen in tv that puts ZERO emphasis on the "comedic relief" of her being bigger than the other characters, she's a badass woman who knows how to fight and lived through two dinosaur infested islands without her weight playing any negative parts in it, and that is so relievng to see as a plus size person.

Fat people aren't hard to draw, look up references, look up tutorials, there are plenty, hell she's not even that big to the point where it is drastically different than drawing a skinny person (because yes, while I wouldn't say drawing plus sized characters is hard, it is definitely different) but it is so easy to not draw her with a waist smaller than her neck.

[landwriter]

Picnic | Dream/Hob | 1.7K | G light and happy fluff, Hob loves springtime, Matthew hates giving dating advice, and the only pining is Dream pining for an A+ in dating, a thing that is both normal to want and possible to achieve

for Domaystic Drabbles, Day 4: Packed Lunch ty to @softest-punk for twigging me to the sweet @domaystic prompts. It got a little out of hand!

----

Hob had seen several thousand fine spring days. He’d seen keen snowdrops surfacing in February, a hundred congregations of crocuses bursting forth to greet the turning of the seasons, and entire delegations of wild daffodils lancing through leaf-fall and trumpeting their blossoms with an attitude that suggested they knew themselves to be the first and only creatures to master the colour yellow. He’d watched six centuries of human habitation dusted with the same fine pollen as alder and birch unfurled their catkins like festival garlands, and he’d— he’d gotten distracted again.

He blinked at the paper in front of him. He’d forgotten it was there. Or that he was meant to be grading it.

That, too: six centuries of the wild joy of spring distracting him from whatever passed for worthy toil at the time. Six centuries of the whiff of warm breeze setting off some yet-unexplained chemical reaction in his brain that made him want to dash outside and not come back in for weeks. Six centuries of him becoming temporarily mad and cheerfully insufferable to all those around him with the joy of it. He’d never get used to it, and Christ help him if he let anyone around him get used to it either.

“What a gorgeous day,” he remarked, to the untouched stack of student work.

It said nothing back, but he beamed down at it anyway, and then, sighing in the manner of a man happy to be defeated, turned his office chair to face the cracked-open window and watch the house martins build their newest nest.

---

“Matthew.”

“Yeah, boss?”

“I require your counsel. For a human matter.” Dream’s brow was furrowed, his manner grave. Hob, then.

Matthew inclined his head and hopped sideways in what he’d decided was the corvid equivalent of girding his loins.

“Hob keeps commenting on the weather on our outings.” He sounded anguished.

“The weather?” he repeated dumbly. Thank fuck. Two days ago it had been the number of orgasms human males required. Daily. Which, good for the two of them, but c’mon. Matthew had really not needed that knowledge about the kind of refractory period and appetite you acquire after half a millenia of boning. Hob, unfortunately, was Dream’s first human boyfriend, and the boss was setting about his new function with all the usual terrifying intensity and insane demands of perfection. In service of this, Matthew (unilaterally and undemocratically, he might add) had been named Arbiter Of All Things Men, which seemed kind of like a reach considering he was a bird, and one who’d been only, like, a little bisexual in his human life. The Corinthian was always skulking around. He wasn’t human either, but at least he’d fucked dudes. He’d have tips. Or Loosh! Loosh knew everything. She could give Dream books and send him off. Instead of Matthew trying to remember how the fuck dating worked.

“-time we’ve met this week.”

“Right,” said Matthew vaguely.

“What does he mean by it? He knows I cannot change the weather in the Waking. He asks nothing of me, and yet it is incessant.”

“Complaining about it, huh? Humans love to complain, boss.”

“No,” said Dream, looking wretched. “Worse. Earnest, ceaseless praise.”

“Oh. Sure. Of course.” What?

Dream was pacing the throne room like he was auditioning for community theater. “At the National Gallery, he daydreamed of the city park outside while feigning to contemplate a Pesellino. I took him to a production of Macbeth at the Globe, and afterwards, he said that even after centuries, it was never less than marvelous to watch. He was referring to the swifts feeding above us in the third act. Naturally.”

Matthew made a sympathetic noise. If he didn’t know when to keep his mouth - er, beak - shut, he’d say that Dream sounded like an insecure lover. Jealous, as best he could tell, of the change of seasons for stealing away some of Hob’s uncannily boundless affections.

“Well?” Dream stared at him in askance.

“Uh.” He floundered. Spring shit, spring shit. “You could take him on a picnic.” Yeah. Chicks loved picnics.

---

Dream had appeared in his office with a wicker basket that looked stolen from a Beatrix Potter story. A delicate gingham square peeked from the lid. It looked big enough to set up a naughty rabbit for life. He set it on Hob’s desk and then primly folded his hands behind his back.

“Hullo, you.” Hob stood and kissed him on the cheek. “What’s the occasion?” He suspected that there was none. Dream had been taking dating him very seriously. It was delightful.

“Matthew has suggested you require a picnic,” said Dream. Except he said it the way someone else might say The doctor has suggested it’s terminal.

Dream had been taking dating him very seriously. It was also, sometimes, awful.

“Oh, darling. That’s so sweet. But I don’t require anything special, you know. Just you, when you’ve got time to drop in. We could do something else.”

“We shall not. I have packed us lunch.”

“Alright, you stubborn creature. Maybe I do require a picnic.” He offered his arm to Dream. “Come on, I know a place.”

---

Lunch was too piddling a word for the spread Dream had packed. Lunch was a crust of bread and ale, or pottage. Lunch was a Sainsbury’s Egg & Cress Sandwich wolfed down with the last of the morning’s flask of Yorkshire Tea. This was a feast. A temple offering. For Hob. His chest twinged a little with affection. God, he was in love.

“This pleases you,” said Dream, who was looking unfairly elegant for someone sat on a gingham blanket with a bit of clotted cream on the side of his mouth.

Hob kissed it away. “Oh, yes.”

“More than our other...dates.”

“Oh,” said Hob, who was sometimes slow on the uptake, but after several centuries, didn’t miss much at all. “I’ve loved all of them. But this-” he gestured sweepingly around at Primrose Hill, the green ash shading them, the pleasant urban pastoral of joggers and families and dogs and other love-struck couples, all breathing in the same warm afternoon air, “-is exactly where I want to be, today. Outside, among all the life. In the thick of spring. It’s perfect.”

Dream followed Hob’s gaze, and studied the tableau. “There is nothing exceptional about this weather or setting.” He sounded as nonplussed as creature with nearly infinite age and knowledge could sound.

Hob laced his fingers through Dream’s, and tried to see what he saw. No great stories, really. Pedestrian daydreams of food and sun and sex, probably, of pay raises and summer vacations to Mallorca and Ibiza. Humanity being predictable, and life doing the same thing it did every year, to Dream’s uncountable thousands.

“No, I suppose not, but that’s why I love it, too. It’s familiar. Constant. Centuries, and it catches me out each time. It’s always arrived, no matter how bad things were for me. Always been there to celebrate with me when they’re wonderful. Like now.”

Dream looked sidelong at Hob. “Like now,” he echoed. Unsure, and stubbornly unwilling to make a question of it. The ache in Hob’s chest redoubled itself.

“Like now,” he promised. “It reminds me of you, too, you know. We always met in June, Dream. In 1789, watching the first trees budding nearly drove me mad with anticipation. Ninety-nine years and nine months. And you were always heralded by the same signs.” He traced circles on Dream’s pale palm, imagining it sun-kissed. “In 1989, when spring turned all the way into summer and you were still gone, I think my heart broke a little. I’d hoped, until then. That you were just late. With the swifts,” he said, quiet.

“Hob.” Dream had moved across the picnic blanket in his preternaturally fast way, and was now more or less in his lap, gripping Hob’s shoulders.

“Sorry,” he said, grimacing. “I’m being horrifically soppy. Must’ve been the scones. It’s alright. You’re here now. All that matters.”

“Robert Gadling,” said Dream. Hob blinked at that. He’d only ever gotten the full name treatment when Dream was still his Stranger, and only then when he’d disappointed him. “If you dare apologize for such a fine expression of your sentiment, I will be wroth with you.”

“Sorry,” he said again, smiling this time.

“I am honoured you associate me with the season you most adore. I would have it that you never pass another Spring waiting for me. If you wished such a thing.”

It sounded a little like a marriage proposal, which was something his heart really could not cope with the full size of at the minute. Not with so much love already around. Not if Dream didn’t intend to say it like that. He went for levity instead.

“Even though it’s driven me to distraction every time you’ve taken me out this week? Even if all I want to do for weeks is lie around outdoors and hold hands?”

Nearby, a baby started wailing. Dream, to his credit, didn’t even glance away. “Yes,” he said, perfectly solemn, perfectly certain. “Even then.”

“Well, that’s alright then,” said Hob, fighting an urge to start crying a little as well. “I would, as a matter of fact. Wish such a thing.”

They looked at each other, besotted, while the wailing continued.

“Only,” murmured Dream, “must it be in Anthropocene?”

“What?”

“Lie down, lover.” Hob did, a delighted suspicion creeping over him as Dream reached into his jacket pocket. Dream stretched over him, and spoke it low into his ear: “And I will take you to a Spring no man has seen.”

---

Matthew was eating scone crumbs and congratulating himself on his good sense to suggest a picnic. Birds loved picnics too. He hadn’t realized how much until this moment. Jesus. Picnics were a great idea. He was going to tell Dream that human men required them weekly during courtship.

“Thanks for bringing home leftovers, boss,” he said, spraying crumbs all over Dream’s shoulder.

Dream was too preoccupied to mind, or even notice. He waved an imperious hand. “It’s nothing. We absconded from the Waking shortly after we arrived. I have finally given Hob a worthy date. I showed him the virtues of picnicking in a Dreaming Spring.” Oh my god. Dream actually had been jealous of the weather. Because he hadn’t made it for Hob.

“What, no ants?” he offered.

“Hardly so prosaic,” said Dream. He glowed with satisfaction. “The very first.”

[idkz19]

just witnessed a bunch of skippstone shippers attack a vinnie stone shipper on yt,, wow.. 😡😡😡😡

[nocountryforiguanodon]

Feathered Philosoraptor on the intersection of geology and linguistics.

[nicxxx5]

up till 5am because i finished camp cretaceous and i love her

[fundinofactoftheday]

Dinofact #62

All known pachycepahlosaurs, except for two species, Ferganocephale and Stenopelix lived during the late Cretaceous. Ferganocephale, which can be traced back to the middle Jurassic, lacks some features on its teeth distinctive to all other known pachycephalosaurs, and Stenopelix, traced to the early Cretaceous, is based on a partial skeleton lacking the skull, which some scientists have now reclassified as a ceratopsian. With both outlying species of pachycephalosaurs sometimes considered nomen dubiums, it is possible that all known pachycephalosaurs lived during the late Cretaceous period.

Source: Wikipedia [1], [2], [3]

[fishyfishyfishtimes]

Daily fish fact #506

Genus Mawsonia!

They were large, shallow water coelacanths that went extinct in the mid-Cretaceous Period! They were very large, reaching estimated sizes of about four meters (13 feet).

[mindblowingscience]

The age of dinosaurs wasn't conducted solely above ground. A newly discovered ancestor of Thescelosaurus shows evidence that these animals spent at least part of their time in underground burrows. The new species contributes to a fuller understanding of life during the mid-Cretaceous—both above and below ground. The new dinosaur, Fona [/Foat'NAH/] herzogae lived 99 million years ago in what is now Utah. At that time, the area was a large floodplain ecosystem sandwiched between the shores of a massive inland ocean to the east and active volcanoes and mountains to the west. It was a warm, wet, muddy environment with numerous rivers running through it.

Continue Reading.

[alphynix]

Ellimmichthyiformes were a group of ray-finned fish known from the early Cretaceous to the mid-Oligocene, about 140-30 million years ago. For much of that time they were quite widespread, found in various marine, estuarine, and freshwater environments across Africa, Eurasia, and the Americas.

Closely related to modern clupeiformes (herrings, sardines, and anchovies), and characterized by two rows of bony scutes – one in front of the dorsal fin and the other along the belly – they're also known by the nickname "double‐armored herrings".

Rhombichthys intoccabilis was a rather unusual-looking ellimmichthyiform from the mid-Cretaceous, around 95 million years ago. Living in shallow reef and lagoon waters covering what is now the West Bank in the Middle East, it was about 20cm long (~8") and had a tall narrow dorsal fin along with incredibly elongated belly scutes that gave its body a rhombus-like profile.

Juveniles of this species seem to have lacked the extended belly scutes, instead having a much more rounded body shape. This may indicate that adults and juveniles occupied very different ecological roles, or that the distinctive scutes might have been a secondary sexual characteristic involved in displaying for courtship and reproduction.

———

NixIllustration.com | Tumblr | Twitter | Patreon

[st4rrmii]

Hold on I'm tryin to spell gorjus

[makairodonx]

This newly-discovered sauropod was the oldest Dicraeosaurid and Diplodocid that has ever lived, hailing from the mid-Jurassic of what is Jaisalmer Formation of Rajastan, India, 168-165 million years ago

[viquipo]

This is sooo summer camp Cretaceous

The kids (Tanner) like Kenji sm cause he knows the brainrot vocabulary while someone tells Ben he's mid and he's like "mid what?"- Darius too except he pretends to know what they're saying and it results in him using the wrong words like "this trip to the lake is so hawk tuah you guys" and everyone laughs at him

[arminreindl]

Prehistoric Planet Croc Ideas

So this was a thing I did on Twitter in anticipation of Prehistoric Planet. Obviously crocs (in this case meaning crocodylomorphs) were a pretty massive part of earth's fauna during the late Cretaceous, and seeing as the first season featured NONE I came to speculate which taxa could hypothetically make an appearance. Now part of the challenge for myself was to come up with a new, interesting contender every day in anticipation of the show's release, each based around the confirmed episides we had and restricted purely to taxa from the Campanian and Maastrichtian. While it took a lot of energy, I did manage to do so. Hell, halfway through they dropped the reveal of Simosuchus, which I had saved for later.

Obviously we didn't get much still, but I'll regardless post my list of candidates and ideas here, perhaps third time's the charme for a lot of these (tho for convenience I'm still ordering them by S2s episode titles). I'll also try to break them apart roughly by biome, starting with islands. PS: I'd love to hear which crocs people would have loved to see themselves. Any on this list or stuff I didn't even mention? Let me know I'm curious.

We got a shit ton of island crocs from the Cretaceous actually, which you can broadly divide into two categories. The crocodiles of the European archipelago as seen in the top row. Featuring the small, possibly shellfish eating Acynodon (art by Adramelech89), the incredibly widespread Allodaposuchus which did have some possibly semi-terrestrial forms (art by Alejandro Blanco, Aina and Agnès Amblás) and Aprosuchus, a tiny terrestrial critter from Hateg (art by @knuppitalism-with-ue). They already give a nice diversity between tiny durophages with blunt snouts, large, more traditional crocs and lanky land species.

The other island category concerns Madagascar, which had a lot of attention in season 2. Discounting Simosuchus, we got Araripesuchus tsangatsangana (art by Scott Hartman) and Mahajangasuchus (art by Mark Hallet). Both are really cool. The former is yet another smaller terrestrial species that may not actually be part of Araripesuchus, while the later is a massive, 4 meter relative of the famous Kaprosuchus that took to the water independently from all other crocs and has been nicknamed "Hippo croc" for its weird skull. Really I'd have loved to seen an episode entirely dedicated to this place.

Next up we had the badlands episode, which oh boy has a lot of contenders from the clade Notosuchia. Brace yourself.

Here again I could split these in two categories. The first is just general badland taxa. There's Ogresuchus for example, from Spain's Tremp Formation (art by Aina and Agnès Amblás). A relatively small sebecid found in a sauropod nesting site. And we all know what PhP does with baby sauropods. Or the long-necked Gobiosuchus (art by @yoofilos) from Mongolia, which may look like its related to the other ones in this category but actually is a far more ancient type of croc.

The far bigger group concerns South America's Notosuchians. ALL OF THESE are from the Bauru Group, with some even from the same single formation. You got Stratiotosuchus (again by Joschua Knüppe), a large terrestrial baurusuchid that filled the nische of mid sized carnivore in an environment shared by sauropods and abelisaurs. There's Pissarrachampsa (by Felipe Alves Elias), another baurusuchid I decided to feature because we have evidence of a nesting site that shows they only had few eggs. A great opportunity to show their tender side. Uberabasuchus (justin_an74), part of the bizzarly proportioned peirosaurids. Adamantinasuchus (by Deverson da Silva), a small, lanky Notosuchian and of course the heavily armored omnivore Armadillosuchus (by the ever talented Júlia d'Oliveira). Hell you could do a full episode just on the foodweb of the Bauru Group (Godoy et al. 2014).

Then there's swamps, which I'll just use to dump all the crocs that don't fit into the other categories.

As you'd expect, freshwater would be ideal for crocs with a more traditional semi-aquatic lifestyle, here represented by three forms. Jiangxisuchus (image by Li et al. 2014) is a paralligatorid, which are tiny crocodilians from the Cretaceous and Paleogene of east Asia. We honestly don't know what they are, some say alligator relatives, others say they are closer to crocs. But its small and cute. Then there's Roxochampsa (artist of the model I couldn't find), which looks suspiciously crocodilian but is actually a relative of Uberabasuchus from the badlands, hell it appeared in the same formation. Still, I reasoned that I'd throw it into this category because I already proposed so much for badlands (none of which came true but hey). And then there's Denazinosuchus (art by Andrey Atuchin). Again it looks deceptively like a modern croc, but is actually the last remnant of the goniopholids, crocodyliforms that were prominent animals in the Jurassic and early Cretaceous. It could have brought both taxonomic diversity nad highlighted croc resilience till the end.

When it came to picking out crocs for Oceans, it got tricky. Obviously season 2 tried to differentiate itself by being set more in the open ocean, not the coast, and true pelagic crocodiles weren't around by the end of the Cretaceous. So I had to settle for coastal animals. There's Sabinosuchus (Schiller II et al. 2016), a cousin to Sarcosuchus and, like Denazinosuchus, one of the last of its lineage. Also its from Mexico which is rarely talked about for its fossils. Rhabdognathus (Ghedoghedo) is a distant cousin, a slender snouted dyrosaur. Unlike pholidosaurs, dyrosaurs actually did really well after the KPG impact and spread around a lot, living way into the Eocene. And finally Chenanisuchus (art by artbyjrc), which like Rhabdognathus was found both before and after the impact that killed the dinosaurs.

And the final two I shall talk about, both of which I thought/hoped would appear in the North America episode. Again, there's certainly overlap, both would have just as much fit into swamps, while many others would have also suited North America. Regardless, here's Brachychampsa (Tom Parker) and Borealosuchus (Chris Masna), both iconic animals from the Hell Creek Formation. One closely allied with alligators and caimans, the other more basal with a head-shape more similar to todays crocodiles.

Now obviously there'd have been a lot more. Part of the challenge to myself was to try and be as diverse as possible, rather than just listing 10 different baurusuchids I went with only two, tried to include as much of the world as possible, etc.... There's also the fact that some really awesome taxa, Titanochampsa, Brachiosuchus and Eurycephalosuchus, all incredibly unique or interesting, were published too late to have been considered for the show. And now, in hinsight, we obviously know that with the exception of Simosuchus none of them made it in. Which is a shame, but maybe next time.