Colorado 'swamp dweller' mammal

Working near Rangely, Colorado, paleontologists have uncovered an unknown state resident—a fossil mammal about the size of a muskrat that may have scurried through swamps during the Age of Dinosaurs.

They identified the creature from a piece of jawbone and 3 molar teeth, and named it Heleocola piceanus. It lived in Colorado roughly 70 to 75 million years ago, at a time when an inland sea covered large portions of the American West. “Heleocola” roughly translates to “swamp dweller” in Latin.

Said one team member, “Colorado is a great place to find fossils, but mammals from this time period tend to be pretty rare. So it’s really neat to see this slice of time preserved in Colorado.”

Compared to the much larger dinosaurs living at the time, like tyrannosaurs or horned ancestors of Triceratops, this new fossil might seem tiny and insignificant. But it was surprisingly large for mammals at the time.

This discovery helps paint a more complete picture of a Colorado that would be all but unrecognizable to residents today. Seventy million years ago, this area was where land met water. Creatures like turtles, duck-billed dinosaurs and giant crocodiles may have flourished in marshes and estuaries, gorging themselves on wetland vegetation and fish.

The bit of mammal jaw emerged from a slab of sandstone that was collected from the site in 2016. The fossil measured about an inch long.

Before an asteroid killed off the non-avian dinosaurs 66 million years ago, mammals tended to be small—about the size of today’s mice or rats. They are largely identified from the tiny teeth they left behind.

In comparison, this one was positively huge. A cousin to modern-day marsupials, this animal weighed 2 pounds or more. But it’s not quite a record. The Didelphodon, another fossil mammal from the same period, may have weighed as much as 11 pounds. H. piceanus’ teeth indicate it dined on plants, with a few insects or small animals mixed in.

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/paleontologists-discover-colorado-swamp-dweller-mammal-that-lived-alongside-dinosaurs/ar-AA1sNCLe?ocid=hpmsn&cvid=ed46623d933043f19069e3bf9a8f9350&ei=83 

Jurassic Park Period Part 7

 Fauna - All the rest of it

 Insects and arachnids - There appears to have been no major extinction of insects at the Triassic–Jurassic boundary. Many important insect fossil localities are known from the Jurassic of Eurasia. The diversity of insects stagnated throughout the Early and Middle Jurassic, but during the latter third of the Jurassic, origination rates increased substantially while extinction rates remained flat. The increasing diversity of insects in the Middle–Late Jurassic corresponds with a substantial increase in the diversity of insect mouthparts. The Middle to Late Jurassic was a time of major diversification for beetles. Weevils first appear in the fossil record during the Middle to Late Jurassic, but are suspected to have originated during the Late Triassic to Early Jurassic. The oldest known lepidopterans (the group containing butterflies and moths) are known from the Triassic–Jurassic boundary. Modern representatives of both dragonflies and damselflies also first appeared during the Jurassic. Although modern representatives are not known until the Cenozoic, insects thought to represent primitive relatives of modern fleas are known from the Middle Jurassic of Asia. These insects are substantially different from modern fleas, because they lack the specialized morphology and they were larger. The earliest group of stick insects first appeared during the Middle Jurassic.

Spiders diversified through the Jurassic, and several long names of species or orders were given in the article. But to me, a spider is a spider. The oldest member of the family Archaeidae is known from the Middle Jurassic of China. Mongolarachne from the Middle Jurassic of China is among the largest known fossil spiders, with legs over 5 centimetres (2 inches) long. I know I've seen granddaddy longlegs with longer legs, but maybe they are not true spiders. It's been a long time since I had the opportunity to count their legs.

Birds - The earliest avialans (birds and their ancestors) appear during the Middle to Late Jurassic. There are some examples from China that have been postulated to have been birds, but have alternatively been found to be a separate lineage of another group of animal altogether. So not only were there birds, but also animals that may or may not have been birds.

Mammals - Mammals originated from cynodonts at the end of the Triassic. Cynodonts were a group of creatures that measured up to 1.5 metres (4.5 feet) in length, and that did include a tail. They may have eaten roots, insects, eggs, and possibly even small or infant dinosaurs. As mammals, they diversified extensively during the Jurassic. While most Jurassic mammals are solely known from isolated teeth and jaw fragments, exceptionally preserved remains have revealed a variety of lifestyles. Some were adapted to aquatic life, similar to the platypus and otters. Some members had a patagium akin to those of flying squirrels, allowing them to glide through the air. One aardvark-like mammal was likely a specialist on colonial insects, similar to living anteaters.

Early relatives of monotremes first appear in the Middle Jurassic of Gondwana. The monotremes are a group of highly specialized egg-laying predatory mammals, containing the platypus and echidnas. There are only five living species of monotreme, contained within two families.

Therian mammals, represented today by living placentals and marsupials, appear during the early Late Jurassic, represented by Juramaia, a mammal closer to the ancestry of placentals than marsupials. Juramaia is much more advanced than expected for its age, as other therian mammals do not appear until a later period.

Two groups of non-mammalian cynodonts persisted beyond the end of the Triassic. One ate insects and has a few records from the Early Jurassic. A herbivorous group of cynodonts has abundant records from the Jurassic, overwhelmingly from the Northern Hemisphere.

Sounds like life was all over the planet, much like it is today. Possibly not quite as diverse as it is today. If we could keep the herbivores out of our crop fields, it might be possible to colonize. And we should be able to hunt, to put meat on the table. I'm a little worried about that, though. If we killed the wrong mammal, would we disrupt the evolutionary trail that would result in humans?

Well, we'd never know about it. There's millions of years between the Jurassic Period and the development of anything resembling humans. There's several possibilities here, that I see. Either our colony would thrive, establishing a new timeline of humans on Earth. By the time 'modern day' came around, we may have taken off for outer space. In which case, we would either all leave and Earth would be devoid of humans. Or not everybody left, and the civilization continued strong, so Earth would have humans, even though it was a mixed-up mess as to how we evolved, showing up so abruptly in the Jurassic. Or at some point, our little piece of civilization would sputter and die, and there would be no humans any more, and who would be here to miss them? Or our civilization would die, and humans would evolve, lending a whole new meaning to the term 'Circle of Life'.

Okay, so we'll take a vote. Everybody in favor of settling down here in the Jurassic Period and establishing a colony, say 'Aye'.

Triassic Period Part 2

 Now let's take a look at the inhabitants of the Triassic Period.

Three categories of organisms can be distinguished in the Triassic record: survivors from the Permian–Triassic extinction event, new groups which flourished briefly, and other new groups which went on to dominate the Mesozoic Era.

To go back to the beginning, after the extinction event just before the Triassic Period began, the Earth's biosphere was impoverished. It was well into the middle of the Triassic before life recovered its former diversity. Therapsids (including what would become mammals) and archosaurs (including crocodilian reptiles) were the chief terrestrial vertebrates of this period. A specialized subgroup of archosaurs, called dinosaurs, first appeared late in the Triassic, but did not become dominant until the succeeding Jurassic Period.

The first true mammals also evolved during this period, as well as the first flying vertebrates, the pterosaurs, who were a specialized subgroup of archosaurs.

In marine environments, new types of corals appeared in the Early Triassic, forming small patches of reefs of modest extent compared to the great reef systems of modern times. The shelled ammonites (whose shell resembled that of the modern nautilus, but is not an ancestor) recovered, diversifying from a single line that survived the Permian-Triassic extinction.

The fish fauna was remarkably uniform, with many families and genera exhibiting a global distribution in the wake of the mass extinction event. There were also many types of marine reptiles. The first of the lizard-like animals appeared in the Early Triassic seas and soon diversified, and some developed to huge size during the Late Triassic.

On land, the surviving plants included ginkos, ferns, and horsetails, among others. Seed plants came to dominate the terrestrial flora. In the northern hemisphere, conifers and ferns flourished. A seed fern genus would dominate Gondwana throughout the period.

Many groups of terrestrial fauna appeared in the Triassic period or achieved a new level of evolutionary success during it. They include lungfish, Temnospondyls (early amphibians that had mostly been replaced by reptiles, they made a come-back in this period), Rhynchosaurs (the primary large herbivores in many Triassic ecosystems), Phytosaurs (looked like crocodiles, but unrelated), Aetosaurs (heavily armored and mostly herbivorous), Rauisuchians (the keystone predators of most Triassic terrestrial ecosystems), Theropods (dinosaurs but not the large kind that would come later; most were 1-2 meters long), and Cynodonts (a large group that includes true mammals, complete with hair and a large brain).

Some amphibians were among those groups that survived the Permian-Triassic extinction event. The first ancestors of frogs are known from the Early Triassic, but did not become common until the Jurassic (which comes next).

Among reptiles, the earliest turtles appeared during the Late Triassic Period.

During the Triassic, archosaurs displaced therapsids as the dominant amniotes. This may have contributed to the evolution of mammals by forcing the surviving therapsids and their mammalia-form successors to live as small, mainly nocturnal insectivores. Nocturnal life may have forced the mammaliaforms to develop fur and a higher metabolic rate.

Though the end-Triassic extinction event was not equally devastating in all terrestrial ecosystems, several important clades of large reptiles disappeared, as did most of the amphibians, groups of small reptiles, and others (except for the proto-mammals). Some of the early, primitive dinosaurs also became extinct, but more adaptive ones survived into the Jurassic. Surviving plants that went on to dominate the Mesozoic Era included modern conifers.

The cause of the Late Triassic extinction in uncertain. It was accompanied by huge volcanic eruptions that occurred as the supercontinent Pangaea began to break apart about 202 to 191 million years ago, forming one of the largest known inland volcanic events since the planet had first cooled and stabilized. Another possible but less likely cause for the extinction event might be global cooling.

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triassic

Permian Period Part 2

 Mammals and reptiles could cope with the desert conditions better than amphibians, and so rose to dominate the Permian. Such dry conditions favored plants with seeds enclosed in a protective cover, rather than plants like ferns, that disperse spores. Modern trees like conifers, ginkgos and cycads appeared in the Permian.

On land, life included diverse plants and fungi. At first, a lot of the Carboniferous flora still flourished. But around the middle of the period, a massive desert covered the interior of Pangaea, and there are indications that the desert was devoid of vegetation. Even in areas where it wasn't such a stark desert, more advanced seed ferns and early conifers moved in. A number of types of plants and animals died out or became marginal elements. By the end of the Permian, swamps reminiscent of the Carboniferous survived only on a series of equatorial islands east of Pangaea that would later become South China.

The Permian saw the diversification of many important conifer groups, including ancestors of many present-day families. Rich forests were present in many area, with a diverse mix of plants. Southern Pangaea saw extensive seed fern forest, and oxygen levels were probably high there. The ginkgos and cycads also appeared.

Insects were very prevalent during the Permian, especially considering that 90% of the insects at the start of this period were cockroach-like insects. Primitive forms of dragonflies were the dominant aerial predators. Several insect groups appeared or flourished during this time, including beetles, true bugs and others.

Larger 'more advanced' types of animal life included reptiles and amphibians. A number of the reptiles seemed to be what I call the 'sail-backed' lizards, where they have bone ridges protruding from their spine and covered in skin. Some of these were herbivore and some were carnivore. I didn't find any indication of how large they might have gotten.

At some point, amphibians declined, and at least one family of the 'sail-backed' lizards was replaced with more advanced animals, including mammals and mammal-like animals. Towards the very end of the period, the first archosauriforms appeared. These were reptiles that possibly rose from the crocodile family and would go on in the next period to produce dinosaurs and pterosaurs. There were no flying vertebrates, although there was a family of gliding reptiles by the end of the period.

Also appearing late in the Permian were the first synodonts, which would evolve into mammals during the next period. Permian synapsids (the group that would later include mammals) thrived and included some large members, such as Dimetrodon. Their special adaptations enabled them to flourish in the drier climate, and they grew to dominate the vertebrates.

In the Permian sea, life was everywhere. You might have found mollusks, starfish, sea dollars, sea urchins and sea cucumbers if you went swimming, or animals very much like these modern versions. But as stated earlier, most of the marine life went extinct during the last days of this period. Nothing was said about the sharks or fish that were so prevalent in the previous period.

Could we live here? Plenty of plants are growing, at least, where it wasn't a desert, so maybe we could grow crops. Could we domesticate some of the herbivore sail-backed lizards? Would we want to? They're lizards, so they wouldn't give any milk. I have no idea how big their eggs might be, so that might be a reason to domesticate them. Okay, we'll leave some of us here to colonize the Permian, and the rest of us will go on to see what comes next.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emeishan_Traps

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cimmeria_(continent)

Carboniferous Period

 The Carboniferous Period spanned 358.9 million years ago to 298.9 million years ago. On a time table, it sits behind the Devonian Period and before the Permian Period.

In the Early Carboniferous Period, average global temperatures were approximately 68 F (20 C). During the Middle Carboniferous, they dropped to about 54 F (12 C). Carbon dioxide levels fell during the period from roughly 8 times today's level at the beginning to about the same as today's level at the end. Lack of growth rings of fossilized trees suggest a lack of seasons, or a tropical climate. Glaciations in Gondwana were triggered by its southward movement, and continued beyond this time period.

Also, there was mountain building as continents collided to form Pangaea. There was a minor extinction event at the end of the period, caused by climate change.

Now, the last we heard, pieces of Gondwana had broken off and were sitting at the equator or slightly north, while the rest of Gondwana drifted south to the south pole.

During the Carboniferous Period, the land was covered by vast forests, which would eventually become the coal beds characteristic of this period's stratigraphy. Some of the Early Carboniferous land plants were very similar to those of the Late Devonian, but new groups also appeared. The main plants of the early period were horse-tails, scrambling plants, club mosses, scale trees, and ferns. The club mosses of this period are cousins to today's tiny club-moss, but not ancestors; and they had trunks 30 meters high and up to 1.5 meter in diameter. Another type of large tree was ancestor of today's ferns. These continued throughout the period, but late in the period, they were joined by cycads (a new form of 'seed fern') and plants related to conifers.

At least one tall plant (6 to over 30 meters tall) was related to cycads (often mistaken for palm trees) and conifers and are thought to have lived in swamps. True conifer trees appeared later in the period and preferred higher, drier ground.

During this period, animals and bacteria had great difficulty processing the lignin and cellulose that made up the gigantic trees. After the trees died, they piled up on the ground, occasionally becoming part of long-running wildfires after a lightning strike. Others very slowly degraded into coal. White rot fungus was the first living creature that could process these trees and break them down.

Animal life was well established by now. Amphibians were diverse and common by the middle of the period, the dominant type of land vertebrates. Some were as long as 6 meters, but most were probably about 6 in (15 cm) in length. Some were aquatic and lived in rivers, while others may have been semi-aquatic. One branch of amphibians would eventually evolve into the first solely terrestrial vertebrates. The cooling climate slowed the evolution of amphibians, who could not survive as well in the new conditions.

Insects, spiders, crustaceans, and others were also very common, and many were much larger than those of today. The atmospheric content of oxygen reached its highest level in Earth's history—35% compared to today's 21%—which allowed the land invertebrates to get so large. There was a millipede-like creature that grew to 8.5 ft (2.6 m) long. Startling to come across, but if you could kill it, there should be some meat on all those legs. This was the largest known land invertebrate of all time. Among the insects, there were the griffinflies, which included a dragonfly-like insect with a wingspan of 30 in (75 cm). This was the largest flying insect ever to roam the planet. Many other insects flew and crawled about, including cockroach ancestors.

Reptiles, however, prospered due to specific adaptations, such as the amniote egg, which allowed the laying of eggs in a dry environment. Some of the small lizard-like animals gave rise to many descendants, including reptiles, birds and mammals.

I wanted to include a statement about the marine animals of the time, but that section of the article was mostly full of names and little else. I did gather than sponges were fairly prolific and diverse. Also sharks evolved into a multitude of shapes and sizes. Although sharks were mostly sea creatures, there was one type that would sometimes visit swamps. At least one marine fish explored river outlets, and fresh-water fish were common in rivers.

During the latter half of this period, there were glaciations, which meant low sea levels. The cooling and drying of the climate led to a minor extinction event at the end of the period. The tropical rainforest fragmented and then was devastated by climate change.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carboniferous

Whale Ancestors

Where did whales come from? How did a fish evolve to become as large as a modern whale?

Actually, whales took a round-about route to evolve into today’s huge ocean creatures. They are actually descended from a land animal.

There are plenty of clues in a whale’s body and biology that their ancestors lived on land:

* They breathe air.

* They nurse their young with their own milk.

* Their paddle-shaped flippers encase hand bones with five ‘fingers’.

* As embryos, whales have tiny back limbs which disappear before birth.

It turns out that hippos are the closest living relatives of whales, but not their ancestors. Both hippos and whales evolved from four-legged, even-toed, hoofed ancestors that lived on land about 50 million years ago. The hippo’s ancestor stayed on land, but the whale ancestor—which was about the size of a goat—moved to the sea and evolved into swimming creatures over a period of about 8 million years, which is quite fast for evolutionary processes.

When fossils of gigantic ancient whales were first discovered, they were mistaken for dinosaur fossils and given the name Basilosaurus. But later, they were recognized as mammals. These prehistoric whales were more elongated than modern whales and had small back legs and front flippers. Their nostrils were situated halfway between the tip of the snout and the forehead. They had earbones just like those of modern whales. Therefore, Basilosaurus showed the link between whales and their terrestrial ancestor.

The current theory is this: That some land-living hoofed animals favoured the flavor of plants at the water’s edge. Eating them had the added advantage of allowing them to easily hide from danger in shallow water. Over time, their descendants spent more and more time in the water, possibly in an ancient estuary, and their bodies became adapted for swimming. The front legs became flippers. A thick layer of fat called blubber replaced their fur coats to keep them warm and streamlined. Their tails became bigger and stronger for powerful swimming, and their back legs shrunk. Their nostrils gradually moved to the top of their heads so that they could breathe easily without having to tilt their heads while swimming. As these creatures began to feed on a different diet, they lost their teeth in favor of a baleen filter method of feeding.

Between these articles, there was some disagreement about what whale ancestors ate. One stated that they favored plants found at the water’s edge. Another felt they ate small land animals and fish found close to shore. Neither article had any information on the teeth whale ancestors had, so their eating preferences seem pretty much up in the air.

So, what can we learn from this tale of whales? Be careful what and where you eat? Evolution is your friend? I find myself wondering if whales would ever come back out of the water, what would they evolve to then? Some version of a goat-sized, hoofed animal again? One of the articles did mention that occasionally, a whale comes along that does have vestigial back legs that are completely encased within their body. Therefore, it seems possible that back legs could make a comeback.

Come on, work with me here. If octopuses can come out of the ocean and become a terrestial bad guy, as some scientists seem to think, then surely whales can also emerge from the oceans. Given enough time to evolve.

 

https://us.whales.org/whales-dolphins/how-did-whales-evolve/

https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evograms_03

https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/when-whales-walked-on-four-legs.html

Nimravs

I couldn’t help but look up Nimravidae; the name reminded me of ‘nimrods’, which of course have nothing to do with Nimravidae. Naturally, I didn’t know that until I looked it up.

The Nimravidae were a cat-like creature whose fossils have been found in North America and Eurasia. They are sometimes called ‘false saber-toothed cats’. They existed from about 40.4 million years ago to 7.2 million years ago, spanning some 33.2 million years.

It is thought that the ancestors of nimravids and cats diverged from a common ancestor about 50 million years ago. Nimravid diversity appears to have peaked about 28 million years ago before the family began a slow descent into extinction. This diversity was apparent in the size and shape of their teeth, as well as the size of the body. Some nimravidae were the size of modern lions, and they had various other smaller sizes down to the size of a small bobcat. Their legs and tails were proportionally shorter than those of true cats.

When nimravid first appeared, the global climate was warm and wet, but it trended cooler and drier shortly after that. This meant the lush forests were transforming to scrub and open woodland, where the nimravids flourished. North America and Asia were connected at the time, and they inhabited both. Europe was more of a cluster of islands rather than a continent at the time, but there must have been some land bridges, for the nimravids also found their way there.

Still later, the woodlands were replaced by savanna in North America and Asia, and the nimravids in those areas died out. Portions of humid forests continued in Europe for a time, but when those died out in the late Miocene, so did the rest of the nimravids.

One has to wonder if the saber-tooth tiger that Fred Flintstone put out of the house every evening was really a saber-tooth tiger or actually a nimravidae.

On second thought, there may be a tenuous connection between ‘nimrod’ and ‘nimravidae’. The dictionary tells me that ‘nimrod’ refers to a person who is good at hunting. As a carnivorous species, the nimravidae had to be good at hunting. Now I wonder if that influenced whoever named this family of creatures. Or what exactly does ‘nimravidae’ mean in whatever language they used to construct this name?

  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nimravidae

https://www.britannica.com/animal/Nimravidae

Giraffe Evolution

I’ve known for some time that giraffes and okapi are related. But in looking up giraffe evolution, I’ve discovered that giraffes are also (distantly) related to pronghorns, deer, musk deer, cattle, goats, sheep, wildebeests, and antelope. What a wide-ranging family! However, the opaki are their closest relative, so close that a 7-million year old fossil had a neck that was a blending of a giraffe neck and an opaki neck.

Giraffe and opaki ancestors once roamed all of Eurasia, but in modern times, they are only found in Africa. Giraffes live in the savanna grasslands, while okapi live in the rain forest.

One possible early ancestor of giraffes is the Canthumeryx, which lived in Libya. No one is sure when it lived; guesses range from 25 million years ago to 14.3 million years ago. It was a medium-sized animal, slender and antelope-like.

About 15 million years ago, Giraffokeryx appeared in the Indian subcontinent. It may have resembled an okapi or a small giraffe. It showed some definite lengthening of the neck.

The Sivatherium ranged throughout Africa and to the Indian subcontinent about 1 million years ago, and may have gone extinct as recently at 8,000 years ago, as ancient rock paintings greatly resemble them. The picture of a reconstruction of one show a pair of horns that look rather like the horns of a Texas longhorn, but only about a foot long each. The neck wasn’t as long as a modern giraffe, and the spots are depicted as being not quite so regular. It stood 7.2 feet tall at the shoulder, with a total height of 9.8 ft and a body weight of up to half a ton. Its shoulders were very strong to support the neck muscles required to life the heavy skull.

There was another giraffe-type animal that ranged from India to Turkey called the Bramatherium, which was closely related to the Sivatherium.

The Shansitherium was a superficially moose- or antelope-like giraffe from the Shanxi province in China. They were closely related to the Samotherium, which was rather like a half-way point between a giraffe and an opaki, as far as size goes.

Giraffes have horns! They are actually called ossicones, being made of bone and covered in furry skin. Some of their ancestors had 2, like modern giraffes, and some had 4. Sometimes they stuck up, or stuck up and curved back, or maybe they stuck out vertically. The Sivatherium horns as I described looked like small longhorns, did not look to be covered in furry skin, but they also had a pair of ossicones above their eyes.

So, if I ever want to make up a giraffe-like alien creature, I now know there is plenty of leeway for using my imagination!

https://evolution-institute.org/how-giraffes-evolved-such-a-large-neck/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giraffidae

Dinosaurs

Like most kids, I had a steady interest in dinosaurs when I was young. I never truly outgrew that interest, and the science magazines I read don’t have much to report on them very often. How disappointing. I long to learn all the new stuff they’ve learned since I was a kid. Can you imagine my surprise a few decades ago when I discovered Fred Flintstone’s powerhouse Brontosaurus never actually existed? It was the result of a few bones that did not necessarily belong together and a scientist’s active imagination while trying to put them together.

One of my school science projects was on dinosaurs. I bought several giant bars of Ivory soap and tried to carve them into various dinosaurs. The T-Rex didn’t want to stand up, the stegasaurus’ back plates were difficult to carve without breaking them off. The easiest to carve was the brontosaurus, which way back then still had a place on the dinosaur family tree.

I can’t do justice to dinosaurs in a few hundred words. After all, they were around - in one form or another - for millions of years. So I plan to look around, pick some interesting versions and report on them over the course of several months.

What do you think you know about dinosaurs? Were they all cold-blooded? Covered in reptile scales or simply skin similar to our own? Did they do any parenting of their young, or simply lay their eggs and move on through the countryside? Did they really evolve into birds? How big did they get? What was their smallest representative? Are there any ‘dinosaurs’ alive today, or maybe animals that look very similar to their ancient ancestors?

I remember a story - I don’t remember if I saw it visually or read it - where a group of hadrosaurs (That’s what I remember their type being, but I may be completely wrong.) had left Earth in some fashion back in the Long Ago, and established a home on another planet in another system. And now their descendants were space travelers and meeting humans in the vastness of space.

Wouldn’t that be something?

Well, since we’re approaching that point where we may be space traveling in a few generations (meaning, outside our home system), maybe we should be considering what evolved dinosaurs might be like. And to do that, we should start by learning what dinosaurs were actually like.

Any suggestions you want me to look at?

Check Your Facts

Several years ago, I got an idea for a science fiction short story. It involved the young captain of a ‘worn-out’ asteroid mining ship who found herself pregnant. Such a thing is hardly novel on Earth, but I had the idea stuck in my head - with no idea where I had gotten it - that it wasn’t possible to get pregnant in space. The entire crew is left wondering, “How did that happen?”

Not terribly original, I suppose, but I hoped I was treating the story ‘differently’ from everybody else who had ever written a ‘mystery pregnancy’ story.

So I took the story to my writing group, where everybody told me that of course, she got pregnant; nobody was using birth control, and there’s no reason why people can’t get pregnant in space.

Bummer. That was one of the things that convinced me that my science knowledge was out of date, where-upon I subscribed to and started reading various science magazines, trying to do some catch-up. Until a week ago, I had tried to shove that space pregnancy story out my mind, figuring it had taught me a lesson; Check your ‘facts’.

I was wrong. But not in the way I thought.

Imagine my surprise when I came to an article in the May/June 2019 issue of Discover about how scientists are studying the problem of human reproduction in places that are not on Earth. The problem being that it doesn’t seem possible. Which would make colonies hard to sustain.

As I remember it, they started with lizards and amphibians, which they took to the space station for a period of time. Those didn’t seem bothered by the lack of gravity, or the increased radiation, but some of their off-spring weren’t right.

Then they tried the same experiment with mice, who are mammals, and - biologically - quite a bit like humans. (That’s a lovely thought, isn’t it?) Strangely, the mice must have been freaked out by the no-g or the radiation, or something, but they were not nearly as interested in sex as mice usually are. And even when they did indulge in sex, they didn’t have any offspring.

Apparently, there is a piece of the female mouse’s sexual organs that rapidly decreases and then completely disappears while the mouse is in space. If the same thing happens to human females, then Earth would be the only place where we can make more humans.

Now, that’s a Bummer. But... I was right! (To a degree.) If technology provides a method of humans to begat humans, but only in places that more or less replicate conditions on Earth, then the first human baby conceived without those conditions would indeed be a shock. Not only for the parents, but for the entire race. And that’s the kind of shock I was trying to portray.

So, yes, you should check your facts that you are putting in your stories. And even if everybody in your writer’s group says your fact is wrong, maybe you should check their facts, too.

Just Another Sink Hole

When you live in Florida, you get used to hearing about sink holes. When one opens up, it is filled with sand and rocks and everyone hopes it doesn’t continue to cause problems, especially if it occurred in a road. Before we moved here, I occasionally heard about a sink hole opening in other places, and they always seemed to swallow a car or two. But sink holes can be fickle things; some start out small and continue to grow until they are huge. Some seem to be bottomless pits that refuse to be filled, no matter how much sand and rocks are thrown into them.

Recently, I heard about a ‘sink hole’ in northern Wyoming, near the base of the Bighorn Mountains. Called Natural Trap Cave, it was discovered in 1970, when it was believed to be some 25,000 years old. Theory says that it opened up alongside a migratory trail used by many species, and they just kept falling in.

Located in a National Park, the sinkhole is 15 feet wide and (currently) 85 feet deep. Chances are that once an animal fell in, it wasn’t getting back out again. When it was first discovered, there was some digging of the bottom of the hole for a few years before it was closed up and left alone. In 2014, a new batch of scientists returned to do some more digging. They were only there for 2 weeks during August of that year, and before they could dig, they had to figure out how to safely get themselves and their gear to the bottom and up again. But what they found when they did get there was stunning; North American lions and American cheetahs, both of which went extinct about 12,000 years ago. During the 70s, scientists had discovered mammoths, short-faced bears, giant camels, and collared lemmings in the pit. Also discovered (but I’m not sure when) were dire wolves, tiny rodents that need to be studied by microscope, bison, grey wolves and horses.

Even though it was August, the scientists reported the hole was like a refrigerator. So much so that some of the skeletons still include DNA, so there will be huge strides in our knowledge of prehistoric genetics.

The 2014 group of paleontologists planned to continue their excavations another 2 years. They estimated that the depth of the pile of dead creatures could be 33 feet, and the digs of the 70s and 2014 had barely scratched the surface. With that said, they thought the bottom of this heap might have animals 100,000 years old.

If that turns out to be true, then this sink hole can’t be only 25,000 years old. That would make this one great, great grand-pappy of a sink hole. And amazingly stable for a sink hole, too.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/11026162/Hundreds-of-Ice-Age-fossils-found-in-ancient-sinkhole-in-Wyoming.html

http://westerndigs.org/wyoming-cave-yields-a-trove-of-ice-age-fossils-and-ancient-animal-dna/

http://www.ibtimes.com/25000-year-old-sinkhole-wyoming-treasure-trove-ice-age-fossils-1655030

https://weather.com/science/news/wyoming-cave-dig-reveals-hundreds-ice-age-fossils-20140809

Prehistoric Groundhog

Groundhog Day happens in February, when everybody - it seems - wants to know ‘Will this winter never end?’ How groundhogs ever got associated with predicting the end of winter is a mystery to me. Did any of them ever get a degree in climatology? No, not a one. They just lay in their borrow, blissfully sleeping through the cold when someone sticks his hand in, grabs one and pulls it out. Still blinking, the confused and shocked groundhog is held up high as a display, a crowd cheers and claps, and then... I don’t know, maybe they stuff the rodent with sweet treats as a reward for being a good sport. Not that the poor guy had any choice in the matter.

I started thinking, ‘Where do groundhogs come from?’ Yes, I know, from mommy and daddy groundhogs. What I mean is, millions of years ago, human ancestors were about the size and shape of a mouse, and they lived underground. Humans are a lot bigger now, and very few of us live underground. So, if we went back to that time - roughly 66 million years ago - would our ancestors be sharing burrows with ancient groundhogs? What would a groundhog from that long ago be like?

66 million years ago, all the southern hemisphere landmasses were gathered together into one supercontinent called Gondwana. Dinosaurs were still around, so I can’t blame our ancestors for seeking safety underground. Groundhogs of that day weighed 20 pounds (about twice the size of today’s groundhogs), had a skull 5 inches long and massive chewing muscles. Let’s see somebody pull one of those out of a sound sleep and hold it aloft!

A sample skull of the creature was found in a rock from Madagascar. This ancient groundhog was probably the largest mammal known for that time period, and lived on seeds, roots and nutty fruits. Its teeth included sharp incisors and wear-proof molars. Large eyes let it see in low light, and the intricate inner ear indicates it could hear higher frequencies than modern man can. A large nasal cavity means it had a keen sense of smell, and most likely it was agile. (The better to dodge large dinosaur feet?)

Alas, that particular rodent has gone extinct. So I’m not sure why it’s called a groundhog. I would assume a ‘prehistoric groundhog’ would be an ancestor of today’s groundhogs, but apparently, it’s only another branch on the family tree of groundhogs. A branch that broke, leaving other branches to fill in the hole.

Well, it did live in Madagascar, so it might have fallen prey to a blind snake, predatory frog or vegetarian crocodile, which were also Madagascar specialties.

www.theguardian.com/science/2014/nov/05/prehistoric-groundhog-vintana-sertichi-gondwana-dinosaurs

www.yahoo.com/news/prehistoric-groundhog-gets-day-204743464.html

www.newscientist.com/article/dn26696-peer-inside-the-head-of-a-giant-prehistoric-groundhog/

Mammals Living with Dinosaurs?

Quick, how long ago did mammals evolve?

Okay, not a fair question, because scientists have only recently discovered it was a lot further in the past than they had thought. How did they find out? Well, they found a ground hog in a 154-pound hunk of sandstone that had been hauled from Madagascar to New York in order to study the fish fossils it contained. Actually, they didn’t find the entire ground hog, only the fossilized skull. And even that didn’t have the lower jaw.

Okay, how much can they really figure out about a creature when all they have is a skull? Quite a lot, it turns out. Dubbed Vintana sertichi, the 5-inch skull indicated the live animal weighed about 20 pounds, which is about twice the size of a modern ground hog. To us humans, that doesn’t sound very big, but it’s heavier than our medium-small dog, and heavier than any house cat I’ve ever owned. In the world of the Mesozoic era mammals, that size makes it a super heavyweight. All the other mammals of the time were about the size of mice.

What else did this skull tell the scientists? Vintana had rodent-like incisors as well as molars that indicated a diet of roots, seeds and fruit. Large eyes meant it could see in low light, while the inner ear configuration indicated it could probably hear higher frequencies than humans can. Its large nasal cavity implied a keen sense of smell.

Keep in mind that in the Mesozoic era of 66 million years ago, the non-mammal neighborhood held dinosaurs (both meat- and plant-eaters), crocodiles, snakes, giant frogs, lizards, fish and a few bird species. It’s a wonder the big guys didn’t just step on the tiny mammals, probably without even realizing they’d done it. If they noticed mammals - even Vintana, at its ‘great’ size - they probably figured that tiny bite wasn’t worth the trouble of chomping on it.

But eventually, like the dinosaurs, all the Vintana sertichi died out and were gone. So it’s a good thing we aren’t descended from them, because we never would have come into being.