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The recovered bones of Seitaad (top) and a restoration of how they were articulated when found in the ground (bottom). From the PLoS One paper.

Even though the first dinosaurs had evolved by 228 million years ago, it was not until the early Jurassic (about 201 million to 176 million years ago) that they were established as the dominant large vertebrates on land. It was during this time that various groups of dinosaurs diversified and began to be adapted in ways which made them quite different from their ancestors, and among these groups were the sauropodomorphs. These were the early relatives of the immense sauropod dinosaurs of the Jurassic and Cretaceous, and an unexpected discovery from southern Utah has shown that these dinosaurs were more widespread that was previously understood.

During the heyday of the early sauropodomorphs, many of the world’s landmasses were still connected, which allowed the dinosaurs to travel between continents that are separated by oceans today. Their remains have been found Africa, Antarctica, Asia, North America and South America, but in some places they are more rare than in others. In North America, especially, the bones of sauropodomorphs are difficult to come by, but as reported in the journal PLoS One by paleontologists Joseph Sertich and Mark Loewen, a new partial skeleton greatly adds to our understanding of these dinosaurs from this part of the world.

The remains, found in the approximately 190-million-year-old rock of southern Utah’s Navajo Sandstone, primarily consist of portions of the hips, partial hindlimbs, most of the forelimbs and shoulders, and several vertebrae and ribs. From its preservation and the geological details surrounding the bones, it appears that the animal died and was subsequently buried by a collapsed sand dune, hence its name Seitaad ruessi, for a sand monster in Navajo lore (Seitaad) and naturalist Everett Ruess (ruessi) who disappeared in southern Utah in 1934. It was preserved articulated within the rock, a body without head or tail.

What is most significant about this fossil, however, is that it is the best-preserved sauropodomorph yet found from the western United States. Paleontologists have been finding fragments of them for years, but this is the first time that enough has been found to compare the dinosaur to its relatives from elsewhere in the world. When Sertich and Loewen did so they found that Seitaad was  most closely related to either Plateosaurus from Europe and its close relatives or Adeopapposaurus from South America and its kin. The trouble was that most of the comparisons made for these dinosaurs so far have relied upon characteristics of bones not preserved in this particular specimen (such as the skull). But it is most certainly a variety of sauropodomorph that probably spent much of its time walking on two legs (like its distant cousin Aardonyx).

Joseph J. W. Sertich, Mark A. Loewen (2010). A New Basal Sauropodomorph Dinosaur from the Lower
Jurassic Navajo Sandstone of Southern Utah PLoS One, 5 (3) : 10.1371/journal.pone.0009789

One of the many dinosaurs that inhabit Dinosaur Valley Mini Golf. Photo courtesy Josee Rainville.

It looks like, outside of museums, mini golf courses are a good place to find dinosaurs. After last week’s sighting from a defunct Maryland course, the owner of Sudbury, Ontario’s Dinosaur Valley Mini Golf let us know that their course boasts more than 20 skeletons of prehistoric animals. Not all of them are dinosaurs, and I think I saw a dragon among the mix, but it still looks like one of the most dinosaur-infested courses around.

Have you stumbled across a dinosaur in an unexpected place? If you have, and have a photo of the encounter, send it to us via dinosaursightings@gmail.com!

The restored head of Dryptosaurus as created by artist Tyler Keillor.

In reaction to my post about Dryptosaurus the other week, paleo-artist Michael Skrepnick told me about the efforts of his colleague Tyler Keillor to create a fleshed-out restoration of the dinosaur. I immediately e-mailed Tyler about the project, and he was kind enough to answer a few of my questions.

Brian: I heard that you have created a restoration of a Dryptosaurus head. Can you tell me a little about the background of the project?

Tyler: There’s a museum about 50 miles Northwest of Chicago in Wauconda, Illinois, called the Lake County Discovery Museum I’d previously worked with the Exhibits Manager there, Steve Furnett, when we both worked in the Field Museum’s Exhibition Department about 10 years ago. Steve was planning a new temporary exhibit called “Prehistoric Lake County,” which would show the types of animals and environments that would have existed in the area during different segments of time. Paleontologist/scientific advisor to the exhibit, Richard Kissel, helped determine what types of animals could be shown in the exhibit based upon local fossils that have been found, and then speculatively which types of animals might have lived in the area during other chapters of time, but for which we have no remains to observe directly. This is where Dryptosaurus came in. It was also a toss up between a Hadrosaurus, or a Coelophysis. But (happily) the Drypto. won out for the reconstruction. The head served as a great attractor to get visitors into the gallery, where there were lots of real and cast fossils,  graphic panels explaining what was known and what was presumed to have lived in the area, as well as a great animation by Chicago animator Pat Bradley.

A restoration of Linheraptor by artist Matt Van Rooijen.

Between 84 million and 75 million years ago, near the end of the Cretaceous, part of the land now known as the Gobi Desert was host to a variety of raptors. There were two species of Velociraptor, a similar predator named Tsaagan mangas, a tiny feathered dinosaur called Mahakala omnogovae, and, as just announced in the journal Zootaxa, a previously unknown type represented by an exquisitely-preserved specimen. It is called Linheraptor exquisitus.

As described by paleontologists Xing Xu, Jonah Choiniere, Michael Pittman, Qingwei Tan, Dong Xiao, Zhiquan Li, Lin Tan, James Clark, Mark Norell, David Hone and Corwin Sullivan, Linheraptor was a relatively small predatory dinosaur most closely related to Tsaagan. Outside of some small differences in the skull, such as the size and placement of small holes (called fenestrae) towards the front of the skull, the two appear to represent a group of unique dromaeosaurs which, while close cousins of their neighbor Velociraptor, lacked some of the specialized characteristics which distinguish their more famous relative.

Further research on Linheraptor has been planned, but I find it especially interesting that the famous Djadokhta Formation (home of the Flaming Cliffs) has yielded another predatory dinosaur. What could it have been eating, and how did it avoid competition with the other raptors in the area? Famous specimens such as the “fighting dinosaurs” have confirmed that some of the raptors fed on Protoceratops, and the numerous kinds of small mammals which lived in the area were probably prey, but the general scheme of “who ate whom” is still incompletely known. The preservation in the Djadokhta Formation is so good, however, that scientists have been able to get a well-defined look into this part of Earth’s history, and with any luck further discoveries will tell us more about the ecology of the area during the time of Linheraptor.

David Hone, one of the authors of the new Linheraptor paper, has more about the find at his blog Archosaur Musings.

XING XU, JONAH CHOINIERE, MICHAEL PITTMAN, QINGWEI TAN, DONG XIAO,, & ZHIQUAN LI, LIN TAN, JAMES M. CLARK, MARK A. NORELL, DAVID W. E. HONE, CORWIN SULLIVAN (2010). A new dromaeosaurid (Dinosauria: Theropoda) from the Upper Cretaceous Wulansuhai Formation of Inner Mongolia, China Zootaxa, 1-9

The National Science Foundation is one of many organizations that fund dinosaur research. From Flickr user hilarymason.

It is not easy being a paleontologist. Even though innumerable museums have dinosaur exhibits and filmmakers are almost constantly calling paleontologists to appear on television documentaries, it is extremely difficult for researchers to find jobs and secure funding for their research. Indeed, there is much more to paleontology than simply finding fossils, and in the latest issue of American Paleontologist, Peter Dodson asks the question “Who pays for dino research?”

As Dodson notes, the post of “academic paleontologist” is a relatively new thing. Prior to the beginning of the 20th century most paleontologists were self-funded enthusiasts who either used their family fortunes (O.C. Marsh and E.D. Cope, for example) or sold fossils (the Sternberg family, for example) to underwrite their work. Studies of dinosaurs became institutionalized in museums and colleges, but like other scientists, paleontologists still struggle to bring in enough money to support their studies. Now and then a wealthy benefactor might provide some funding, and some foundations set aside money for exciting dinosaur research, but for most paleontologists most of the time, research funding comes in the form of grants.

Securing a grant can be a trying task. Paleontologists continually write to different foundations and societies in the hopes of winning some of the more prestigious grants (which, Dodson says, are typically those that bring in the most funding to the paleontologist’s home institution). Among the biggest pools to which researchers apply is the government agency the National Science Foundation. The overall budget of the agency is over $6 billion, but a relatively tiny slice of that pie goes to paleontologists in a given year. As calculated by Dodson, between 1983 and 2009 the NSF awarded 88 grants to carry out research on dinosaurs and their close relatives, totaling a relatively modest $11 million in funds. Most dinosaur specialists rely on funding from other sources for most of their careers.

For paleontologists, Dodson concludes, funding research is catch-as-catch-can. Scientists are continually submitting and resubmitting proposals to foundations like the NSF in the hopes of receiving large grants that will allow them to comfortably carry out their work, yet most of the time dinosaur specialists must rely on a collection of smaller grants, the patronage of private donors, partnerships with television companies, and other opportunities in order to keep working. These days being a successful paleontologist requires business acumen as well as intellectual creativity. While it can be difficult to find funding, the rewards of such efforts—a better understanding of ancient life—are well worth the struggle.