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A New Fossil Whale

A New Fossil Whale

Today’s whales come in two basic varieties: those with baleen, and those with teeth. These two varieties reflect a difference in how whales eat. The ones with baleen (Mysticetes) filter out the tiny plankton they eat by bringing in large mouthfuls of water and then pushing the water through

Vegavis and the Honks of the Cretaceous

Vegavis and the Honks of the Cretaceous

In mid-October, a paper was published that described the first voicebox ever found for an ancient bird. Let’s dive right in! Off the coast of Antarctica, there is an island called Vega. It sits just east of the Antarctic Peninsula. Two specimens of the extinct duck, Vegavis iaai were

A Week at a Scientific Conference

A Week at a Scientific Conference

In mid-October, I spent a week in Salt Lake City, Utah with many of the world’s paleontologists for the annual meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology (SVP). Earlier this year I went to a conference called PaleoFest at the Burpee Museum in Rockford, Illinois. And in June I

A Dinosaur Brain?

A Dinosaur Brain?

If you know me (or have read my research website), you know that I study dinosaur brains. So, a paper published just last week about the discovery of a new, fossilized dinosaur brain is perfect for this blog. The paper describes a natural endocast of an iguanodontian dinosaur. What’s

The Mighty Platypus

The Mighty Platypus

When the platypus was first discovered in Australia, European settlers thought it was fake. You can imagine why. No other animal has a duck-bill, a beaver tail, otter feet, and lays eggs. They’re also one of the only mammals with venom. The platypus belongs to a group of mammals

A Whale of a Tale

A Whale of a Tale

This week, an [article] was published in which the authors try to answer the question: “How many times did whales become big?” In biology, there are a couple of ‘rules’ about how large body size is evolved. Cope’s Rule says that over evolutionary time, lineages of animals tend to

The Largest Footprint Ever Found and the Oldest Sauropod Trackway

The Largest Footprint Ever Found and the Oldest Sauropod Trackway

I’ve talked about Titanosaurs before on this blog, but I’ll briefly describe titanosaurs for those just tuning in. Titanosaurs are amazing because of their size. They are the largest animals that ever walked on Earth. Being that big required a lot of physical changes to keep their bodies