All about dinosaurs, fossils and prehistoric animals by Everything Dinosaur team members.
20 09, 2010

Extreme Tides Attract Fossil Hunters to South Coast

By |2023-01-12T14:50:22+00:00September 20th, 2010|Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Main Page|0 Comments

Fossil Enthusiasts Attracted to Lyme Regis

The extreme tides along the Dorset coastline was the topic we chose to write about in one of our recent web log posts.  Very low tides which had been preceded by stormy weather and rough seas would mean that lots of new fossil material would be exposed on the beaches at locations such as Lyme Regis and Charmouth in Dorset.  These conditions will have attracted fossil hunters from far and wide.

To read our original article: Low Tides could Lead to a Fossil Finding Bonanza.

Fossil Hunters

The lowest tides of the year, would, we predicted, provide fossil enthusiasts the opportunity to discover some amazing fossil material.  Our article was picked up by a local newspaper (Bridport and Lyme Regis News – Dorset) and ourselves and one of our fossil finding chums, Brandon Lennon of  Lyme Regis Fossil Walks were featured in a newspaper report.

Brandon, was even telephoned by one of the journalists as he took a party on one of his fossil walks to explore the beach.   As Brandon says, he was telephoned “to give a live update on the fossil discoveries.”

Under Brandon’s expert guidance his party had found some super Ammonite fossils, including an Asteroceras.  Some Ichthyosaur vertebrae (marine reptile), were found a little further up the beach.  It seems our predictions about there being a fossil finding bonanza came true.

Clipping from the Local Newspaper

Picture credit: Bridport and Lyme Regis News

The picture shows Brandon (far right) on one of his guided fossil walks.  The newspaper article comments that fossil hunters were alerted to the chance of finding some amazing fossils by the “respected national website Everything Dinosaur”.  The article went onto quote a spokesperson from Everything Dinosaur who said:

“This could lead to a number of exciting fossil finds as a combination of rough seas in the previous few days and low tides expose potential new discoveries”.

It is nice to know that our little blog (not so little now I suppose as we approach our 1,200th article), is able to help promote and publicise fossil hunting activities in the UK.

Visit Everything Dinosaur’s website: Everything Dinosaur.

19 09, 2010

Carnegie Dinosaur Collection – New Models

By |2023-01-12T14:52:13+00:00September 19th, 2010|Dinosaur Fans, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Main Page|0 Comments

Carnegie Cryolophosaurus and Carnegie Ichthyosaurus Models

The two new additions for this year to the Safari Carnegie Dinosaur Collectibles are the Cryolophosaurus dinosaur model and the Ichthyosaurus model (Jurassic marine reptile).

Cryolophosaurus – Carnegie Museum of Natural History Model

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

To view the large range of Safari Ltd prehistoric animal models available from Everything Dinosaur: Safari Ltd. Wild Safari Prehistoric World.

Carnegie Dinosaur Collectibles

Fossils of this theropod dinosaur dating from the Early Jurassic have been found in Antarctica, halfway up a mountain, at approximately 4,000 metres above sea level.  Not only was this excavation site one of the most difficult to reach, the palaeontologists working to extract the fossilised bones of this dinosaur had to endure extreme cold.

Fossils of Ichthyosaurus can be found closer to home, we have helped remove a number of ichthyosaur fossils from Middle Jurassic strata on the coast of Dorset (England), there are also many fine specimens of this marine reptile found elsewhere in Europe, in Germany for example.

The Carnegie Ichthyosaurus Model

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

To view the extensive range of marine reptiles in the Safari Ltd model range including mosasaurs, ichthyosaurs and Elasmosaurus: Wild Safari Prehistoric World Models and Figures.

Note the lovely touch in the Carnegie Ichthyosaurus model, with the ammonite in its mouth.  Whether or not these “fish lizards” ate ammonites is open to speculation.  Since many specimens of ichthyosaurs had no teeth in their long, slender jaws, palaeontologists have suggested that these creatures actually fed on soft bodied animals such as fish, belemnites and other cephalopods, not hard-shelled ammonites.

18 09, 2010

Young Dinosaur Fans show their Appreciation of Tyrannosaurus rex

By |2023-03-06T09:25:43+00:00September 18th, 2010|Dinosaur Fans, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Main Page|0 Comments

All Creatures Great and Small

Young dinosaur fans show their appreciation of and fascination for the huge theropod dinosaur Tyrannosaurus rex. Fans of an iconic dinosaur get to handle fossil bones.

Yesterday, we were corresponding with the American Museum of Natural History with regards to their work on the published paper summarising the developments over the last decade in tyrannosaur research.  This paper, which is featured in the scientific journal “Science” details research carried out by some of the world’s most respected and important natural history museums.

Today, we received a letter and picture from a keen dinosaur fan who we met at one of our fossil casting sessions in the Summer who, unsurprisingly, is a big fan of Tyrannosaurus rex.

Tyrannosaurus rex

Mum Clare, sent us the picture of her young palaeontologists Jamie and Harry with one of our team members and a substantial piece of a Tyrannosaurus rex.  We received a lovely letter from Jamie, he wrote to us and enquired about Gigantoraptor (G. erlianensis), he even included a super drawing of a T. rex.  We emailed a fact sheet on Gigantoraptor, as written by our dinosaur experts, over to Jamie, plus some pictures of this very weird dinosaur, all in a days work for our team members.  Who knows, perhaps Jamie and Harry will be discovering and describing their own dinosaurs one day or even contributing to the research on Tyrannosaurus rex.

Young Dinosaur Fans Appreciate T. rex

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur/Mum (Clare)

Our thanks to Mum, Jamie and Harry, it is always a pleasure to meet such clever and enthusiastic dinosaur fans.

Visit the award-winning and child-friendly Everything Dinosaur website: Everything Dinosaur.

17 09, 2010

Tyrannosaurs have Changed a lot in the Last Decade

By |2023-03-06T09:35:30+00:00September 17th, 2010|Dinosaur and Prehistoric Animal News Stories, Dinosaur Fans, Main Page, Press Releases|0 Comments

Scientific Understanding of T. rex Revised by a Decade of New Research and Discoveries

Tyrannosaurus rex may be the most iconic of all the dinosaurs, but the Tyrannosauroidea family are a bit of an enigma, how these large, Late Cretaceous predators evolved has remained very much of a mystery to palaeontologists.  However, over the last ten years or so, our understanding of these most famous of all the dinosaurs has grown tremendously as new discoveries have been made and new research techniques to existing fossils applied.

Tyrannosaurus rex

Since the Barnum Brown discoveries in the early 20th century that led to Osborn’s formal description of Tyrannosaurus rex, this dinosaur has certainly captured the imagination.  So nearly called Dynamosaurus, the “King of the Tyrant Lizards” has become one of the most famous and iconic entities on the planet.  If T. rex was a brand it would be alongside the household names, or perhaps as well known as the most famous footballers of today.  However, as more tyrannosaur fossil material is discovered and more fossils studied scientists have learnt more about these theropods in the last ten years or so than they did in the preceding century.

To read an article published by Everything Dinosaur in 2007 acknowledging 100 years of T. rex research: Celebrating 100 years of Tyrannosaurus rex.

One of the Original Papo Replicas of Tyrannosaurus rex

The Papo Green Standing Tyrannosaurus rex dinosaur model.

The last of its kind, the Papo green standing T. rex dinosaur model.  An earlier interpretation of T. rex.

The picture above shows a T. rex model that was first produced around fifteen years ago, our views about this dinosaur have changed considerably in the last ten years.

The dinosaur model is from the original Papo model series, to view the range of Papo dinosaur models in stock at Everything Dinosaur: Papo Dinosaur and Prehistoric Animal Models.

A New Scientific Paper

Raising the awareness of a new paper that summarises this research, team members at Everything Dinosaur were sent a press release from the communications team at the American Museum of Natural History (New York).  Tyrannosaurus rex continues to intrigue, but thanks to a lot of dedicated and devoted scientists we are beginning to understand the phylogeny and the taxonomic relationships between tyrannosaurs and other members of the Dinosauria.  In a scientific journal “Science” more details about the research into the tyrannosaur family and their family tree has been published, for us at Everything Dinosaur, T. rex and company remain pretty cool dinosaurs.

We’ve all heard this story: the Late Cretaceous of Asia and North America—about 66 million years ago—was dominated by several large-headed, bipedal predatory dinosaurs like Tyrannosaurus rex and Tarbosaurus that had tiny arms.  But a decade of new fossil discoveries that have more than doubled the number of known tyrannosaur species has changed this tale.

Older and smaller tyrannosaurs have made the evolutionary tree of this group richer and more complex.  Furthermore, a series of innovative research projects on topics like bone growth and biomechanics have added an enormous amount of information about tyrannosaurs, so much so that the group could now be considered an exemplar for studying many themes in palaeontology research.

Mark Norell, curator in the Division of Palaeontology at the American Museum of Natural History stated:

“T. rex is the most iconic of all dinosaurs.  Its star power has allowed a research focus into questions not normally undertaken with fossils, questions like bone growth, biomechanics and neurology.

Up Close to the “Business End” of a T. rex

Titus the T.rex exhibit

The spectacular Titus the T. rex exhibit at Wollaton Hall.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

Stephen Brusatte, a graduate student affiliated with the American Museum of Natural History and the first author of this new paper, printed in “Science” went on to add:

“We know more about tyrannosaurs than any other group of dinosaurs – even more than some groups of living organisms.  Over the past year, five new species of tyrannosaurs have been described, and over the last ten years we have found the oldest and smallest members of the group.  Now we can understand the family tree of tyrannosaurs in unprecedented detail.”

The “Science” paper combines a new analysis of tyrannosaur phylogenetics, or their genealogy, with a review of recent research into their biology.  After scoring 19 well-documented tyrannosaur fossils for over 300 different traits, the researchers developed the most comprehensive evolutionary tree of this group to date.  This essentially redefined tyrannosaurs, at least when compared to the popular perception of them as large meat-eaters.

Tyrannosaurs have a long evolutionary history of which the largest, T. rex, Albertosaurus, and Tarbosaurus, represent species that were ecologically dominant only during the Late Cretaceous in Asia and North America.  Earlier tyrannosaurs, on the other hand, lived up to 100 million years before the large apex (top) predators, which were often small in size (some one-one hundredth of the size of T. rex and akin to a lynx in body mass), and lived all over the world.

Stephen Brusatte commented:

“T. rex is really just the tip of the iceberg of the tyrannosaur diversity, and honestly, is quite abnormal when compared with other members of the group.  For most of their evolutionary history, tyrannosaurs were small and living in the shadow of other giant apex predators.  They stayed small until the end of the Cretaceous – the final twenty million years of dinosaur history.”

The new paper also reviews exciting research on tyrannosaurs, including biomechanical analyses of how quickly they could run (work of co-author John Hutchinson of the Royal Veterinary College, here in Britain.), how quickly they grew (work of co-author Gregory Erickson of Florida State University and Norell), demographics of the population (Erickson), and reconstructions of the brain and neurology (work of co-authors Amy Balanoff of the American Museum of Natural History and Gabe Bever of Yale University).

Dr Norell added:

“The work on tyrannosaurs underscores how much can be done using modern techniques to understand the biology of fossil organisms.  Many of us in the field now look at ourselves as biologists who just happen to work on dinosaurs.”

In addition to Norell, Brusatte (who is also affiliated with Columbia University), Hutchinson, Erickson, Bever, and Balanoff, other authors include Jonah Choiniere of the American Museum of Natural History, Thomas Carr of Carthage College, Peter J. Makovicky of the Field Museum, and Xing Xu of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (People’s Republic of China).  This research was funded by the National Science Foundation, the American Museum of Natural History, Natural Environment Research Council of the U.K., the National Natural Science Foundation of China, and Special Funds for Major State Basic Research Projects of China.

From our perspective at Everything Dinosaur, the evolving story of Tyrannosaurus rex (no pun intended) serves another purpose.  For example, T. rex was at the centre of an exhibition we were involved with in Birmingham (United Kingdom) in the Summer.  Although for us, the debate over whether T. rex was a predator or scavenger is certainly not new, it enables us to engage and motivate young people to learn about Earth sciences.  T. rex and its cousins are probably responsible for persuading many a student to give geology, palaeontology and other Earth sciences ago.

Our thanks to Kristin at the American Museum of Natural History for sending us the press release and picture.

16 09, 2010

Scientists Strive to Protect Dinosaur Tracks

By |2023-02-25T20:10:32+00:00September 16th, 2010|Dinosaur and Prehistoric Animal News Stories, Main Page|2 Comments

Scientists in New Jersey Working Hard to Preserve Dinosaur Trace Fossils

Palaeontologists and geologists are working hard to gather as much scientific data as possible from a site rich in Jurassic trace fossils before the building of a new housing development is completed. Scientists strive to get as much data as possible from rare dinosaur tracks.

Dinosaur Footprints

The location, part of an extensive development of more than 800 residential homes is in Passaic County, in the north of the U.S. state of New Jersey, the site and surrounding quarries have provided scientists with a number of fossils including a variety of dinosaur footprints preserved in the sandstone strata.

The state of New Jersey is synonymous with important dinosaur discoveries, one of the most complete dinosaur fossils known at the time and the first officially noted dinosaur fossil bone discovery in the United States was made at Haddonfield, New Jersey.  These fossils turned out to be the bones of a duck-billed dinosaur, it was named Hadrosaurus foulkii, although this genus is now regarded as Nomen dubium (the validity of this genus is in doubt).

Meetings have been taking place between Montclair State University professors, state museum geologists and representatives of the building company to discuss how best to preserve the newly discovered dinosaur tracks without holding up the building works.

Locations in the north of New Jersey have provided scientists with a number of dinosaur trackways to study, Dr Matthew Goring, a professor of Earth and environmental sciences at Montclair State University commented:

“It’s important to preserve as much as you can, but what they can save depends on how they [the builders] excavate the rock.  In some cases there’s just no way to hope the guys digging with a backhoe are going to recognise what they are digging.”

As the large blocks of sandstone are removed, plans are in place for geologists from the New Jersey State Museum (Trenton) to examine them and identify important fossils.

Dr Goring went on to add:

“They’ll be big blocks of rock that they will pick up and put in a pile that will be well worth going through.”

Dinosaur Tracks

However, finding any fossils is the easy part, as Dr Goring admits, if the geologists do find anything of interest they will have the challenge of transporting and rocks to a safe area where they can be properly studied.

Dr Goring put it succinctly when he said:

“Even to just preserve twenty yards of trackway is just tons and tons of rock.”

Retired school teacher Chris Laskowich, has lived in the area for many years and has spent a great deal of time studying the dinosaur tracks and other fossils found in the area.  He put together a petition with more than a 1,000 signatures requesting that this site, marked for building work, could be preserved because of its scientific interest.

Chris stated:

“This one in particular, what’s called the UBC Quarry, has been called the most important quarry in New Jersey and on this side of the Atlantic for the number of species of plants and animals it shows from the beginning of the Jurassic period.”

Exposed fossil bearing strata from the Early Jurassic is particularly valuable to scientists, there are few exposed deposits worldwide and there is still much to learn about the diversity of Mesozoic life around 200 million years ago.  Indeed the entire Triassic/Jurassic geological boundary is still blurred and a revision of the start of the Jurassic period is due to be considered by the International Commission of Stratigraphy (ICS).

Mr Laskowich said that the dinosaur tracks represent a number of genera and they range in size from under 3 cm to over 35 cm long and stated that the site was:

“extremely prolific and it is a shame that it was touched at all”

A spokesman for the construction company said that they had began construction back in 2005 and had called in geologists as construction was nearing completion.  He commented that the company was excited about working with the museum teams to help preserve and record a bit of the history of the area.  The spokesman emphasised the close working relationship between the construction firm, the local community and the scientists.

John McCauley, a professional microbiologist and amateur palaeontologist had put together another petition, this time urging the location of the trackways to be excluded from the development, but as most of the tracks are to be found on private land already approved for building this is not a likely course of action.

He stated:

“Hopefully they can make some agreement where they can preserve these fossils.”

He went onto explain that allowing geologists to sift through excavated piles of rock was not ideal because knowing specifically where the tracks had laid was very important.

Studying Dinosaur Tracks

Comparing different types of dinosaur footprint.  Studying dinosaur tracks.

Theropod print compared to an ornithopod print. Studying dinosaur tracks. Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Officials at Passaic County have urged all parties to consider issues regarding health and safety, stating that they did not want unauthorised individuals coming to the construction site.

A curator at the state museum, David Parris, visited the dig site last week, with other interested parties, as although the museum  had already removed some fossils from this location, the builders and uncovered new material.

He stated:

“In the course of the construction they uncovered one exposure of rock that has not been seen or previously investigated.”

He went on to add that staff from the museum were willing to work after hours to excavate the new material and that everyone there would do their best to preserve the scientific material that comes out of the site.

Let us hope that a compromise can be reached, cooperation between all the interested parties is paramount in situations like this, after all, Jurassic footprints stopped being made approximately 144 million years ago.

For models of North American dinosaurs, fossils of which are found in Jurassic-aged rocks: Safari Ltd. Wild Safari Prehistoric World Models.

15 09, 2010

Bird with a Toothy Grin – Huge Prehistoric Seabird From Chile

By |2023-03-06T09:33:11+00:00September 15th, 2010|Dinosaur and Prehistoric Animal News Stories, Main Page|2 Comments

Giant Seabird with a Toothy Grin – Pelagornis chilensis

Soaring over the skies of what is now Chile some 10 million years ago was a huge seabird, unlike any found today, a giant, with a wingspan of approximately 5 metres and a beak full of sharp, pointed “pseudo teeth”.  This large pterosaur-sized creature has been named Pelagornis chilensis and a full paper on this saw-toothed seabird appears in the latest edition of the scientific publication “The Journal of Vertebrate Palaeontology”.

Prehistoric Seabird

Fossils of these strange birds ascribed to the genus Pelagornis have been found at a number of Tertiary aged sites, scientists believe that these birds evolved sometime in the Late Palaeogene and survived up until the end of the Pliocene epoch.  The bones of these birds were extremely light and delicate and most of the specimens found to date are badly crushed and very little articulated material is known.  However, this new South American species has been identified based on an “exquisitely and exceptionally preserved” fossil specimen according to co-author of this study, David Rubilar of the Museo Nacional de Historia Natural in Santiago (Chile).

A Super-soaring Prehistoric Bird

The publication of this paper on this super-soaring prehistoric bird comes at an important time for the museum, as on Tuesday 14th September the Museum celebrated 180 years of scientific work and curation, making this establishment older than the Natural History Museum in London.  The phylogeny (the development or evolution of a particular group of organisms), of these “pseudo-toothed birds” is uncertain, most scientists associate them with the Albatrosses or Pelicans, it is hoped that this new fossil material will help palaeontologists to learn more about the taxonomy of these creatures and their relationships with modern extant Aves.

An Artist’s Illustration of P. chilensis

Picture credit: Carlos Anzures

Pelagornis chilensis

The specimen includes the largest and most complete fossil bird wing yet discovered, the fine grained, sandstone strata in the north of Chile where the fossil was found could yet yield more information about these strange and enigmatic birds.  The tooth-like structures in the jaws are not teeth, but adaptations of the beak that permitted these seabirds to catch and hold slippery fish and squid in their beaks.  Birds lost their reptilian teeth as a result of natural selection, adapting to a need to have lighter skeletons to enable more efficient flight.

The likes of Pelagornis evolved originally from birds with normal beaks, but the “pseudo-teeth” and the albatross-like skeletons suggest a sea-going lifestyle and hunting fish and other slippery creatures out at sea.

Previous fossils of Pelagornis have been badly crushed making it difficult to estimate wingspans, but the superb preservation of this particular specimen has led scientists to confidently estimate that this species had a wingspan of seventeen feet or more, nearly 50% bigger than the wingspan of most modern Albatross’s.  When on the ground, these birds would have stood nearly 1.25 metres tall, about the size of a six-year-old child.

A Close up of the “Pseudo Teeth” in the Beak

The beak with the “peudo teeth”

Picture credit: S. Tränkner, Forschungsinstitut Senckenberg

The picture above shows the robust and powerful beak of P. chilensis.  The “pseudo teeth” superficially resemble the teeth found in a number of rhamphorhynchids, a group of pterosaurs which scientists believe were also mainly fish-eaters.  As the fossil skeleton is structurally similar to a modern albatross’s, studying the albatross may help scientists to understand the likely habits and behaviours of this extinct leviathan.  Note the large orbit (eye socket), in the skull, an indication that these birds had large eyes and probably excellent eyesight.

More fossils might be unearthed soon, as David Rubilar commented:

“The fossils in this [sandstone layer] are abundant… probably we will find more and more complete specimens in the future.”

An Extremely Successful Group of Birds

Estelle Bourdon, a researcher with the American Museum of Natural History (New York), although not directly involved with this particular study, stated that these type of birds were extremely successful and seemed to have existed for many millions of years as a group.  Fossil evidence suggests they evolved in the early Eocene Epoch, went onto establish themselves worldwide and finally went extinct at the end of the Pliocene Epoch.

Perhaps, these creatures filled the ecological niche that was vacated with the extinction of the last of the pterosaurs at the end of the Mesozoic.

Lead author, Gerald Mayr of the Forschungsinstitut Senckenberg (Germany) commented:

“Although they would have looked like creatures from Jurassic Park, they’re true birds and not flying reptiles.  In fact, it is possible some of the the last living members of P. chilensis existed at the same time as the earliest human ancestors in Africa.”

The research team have concluded that P. chilensis was probably a glider, as the skeleton does not permit extensive flapping movement of the wings.

An Artist’s Illustration of the Skeletal Structure of P. chilensis

Pelagornis skeleton.

Picture credit: Carlos Anzures

The artist’s rendering shows the bird’s skeleton and the wingspan, aproaching an impressive five metres.  An analysis of the arm bones shows that this bird could not rotate its wings to flap and provide lift, the research team have concluded that rather like Andean Condors today, these creatures simply “opened their arms” to take to the air, catching updrafts rising from hills and other geological features to become airborne.

Just like many modern, large seabirds Pelagornis chilensis could probably have glided for many hundreds of miles with a great efficiency of effort.

The researchers have compared the arm bones of this new specimen to the bones of Argentavis magnificens, an extinct Condor whose fossils have been found in Argentina.  With a wingspan in excess of 8 metres, it is A. magnificens that currently holds the world record for the largest known flying bird.

However, the arm bone of P. chilensis is nearly 40 percent longer, so co-author David Rubilar is optimistic that larger specimens of P. chilensis could challenge this record.  He pointed out that as A. magnificens probably had longer feathers it retains the world record for the largest flying bird known to science – at least for now.

For us at Everything Dinosaur, it is fascinating to note how the Aves radiated after the Cretaceous extinction event.  This Order diversified and exploited a huge number of environmental niches.  For example, it can be argued that these huge gliders replaced the fish-eating pterosaurs and other types of bird, such as the members of the Phorusrhacidae {thanks for the correction} (Terror Birds) evolved into large, cursorial predators replacing the theropods.

For replicas and models of prehistoric animals including prehistoric birds: Prehistoric Animal Models and Extinct Birds.

14 09, 2010

Last Safe Posting Dates for Christmas 2010

By |2023-03-06T09:36:59+00:00September 14th, 2010|Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Main Page, Press Releases|0 Comments

Last Posting Dates for Christmas 2010

Well it’s that time of year again, the evenings are drawing in, the cricket season in the UK is nearly over and Everything Dinosaur team members are complaining that the warehouse is getting cold – we must be on the run up to Christmas.  So once again, we are putting in place plans to assist our customers with their Christmas gift choices.  Team members are on hand to advise telephone callers and help where they can.  We have got staff sorted to cover the extra shifts in the warehouse and we have the Saturday morning rota already prepared to make sure we can pack and despatch customer’s orders on a Saturday morning if required.

Everything Dinosaur

As always our efficient staff quickly respond to emails sent to them and we have produced a chart providing information on the last safe posting dates for Christmas parcels and gifts sent from the UK overseas.

Last Recommended Posting Dates (Royal Mail)

Table credit: Everything Dinosaur

Whilst staff at Everything Dinosaur do all they can to promptly despatch goods, and to provide accurate information on posting dates, it may be worthwhile checking with Royal Mail to obtain the latest postal information.  Remember, the dates provided in the table above, are the last recommended posting dates.  Postal staff and postal services get very busy in the run up to Christmas, posting early is recommended and rest assured our helpful staff will be on hand to assist customers with any queries that they may have.

Visit Everything Dinosaur’s award-winning and user-friendly website: Everything Dinosaur.

13 09, 2010

China Issues New Regulations to Protect their Fossils

By |2023-03-06T11:15:38+00:00September 13th, 2010|Dinosaur and Prehistoric Animal News Stories, Main Page, Palaeontological articles|0 Comments

China’s State Council issue New Regulations to Protect the Country’s Fossils

The Chinese Government has introduced new regulations to protect the country’s fossil heritage and to deter the illegal sale of Chinese fossils and artefacts.

China has grown in importance to palaeontologists over the last fifty years or so, as more of the geology of that vast country is explored and greater numbers of significant fossils unearthed.  Virtually, every major geological period is represented by exposed or outcropping strata in that huge country and sites such as the quarries near Zigong in Sichuan Province and sites at Sihetun in Liaoning Province are world famous for their spectacular dinosaur fossils.  In a bid to help protect China’s fossil heritage and to help deter illegal fossil hunting activities, the State Council has issued new, tighter regulations and stricter controls on the legitimate exploration, transfer and exchange of fossil material.

Fossil Heritage

The regulations come into force at the beginning of next year and they forbid the taking of fossils that have not yet been formally identified and stipulate any fossil exhibition under state protection must seek approval from the authorities before travelling abroad.  This new set of rules cover both body and trace fossils, although more recent fossil material including human remains are subject to conditions laid down by that part of the Government responsible for cultural activities.

Under these new regulations, authorities of the State Council are entitled to trace and claim fossils that were illegally transported outside China.  In addition, State-owned entities are not allowed to sell, exchange, or give away palaeontology fossils to private entities or individuals, and palaeontology fossils are not allowed to be sold, exchanged, given away or pledged to foreigners or foreign-owned organisations.  These new rules are designed to help protect China’s fossil heritage, the scale of illegal sales and fossil smuggling is unknown but it is suspected that there is a large black market for fossils from China.

Deter Smuggling

To read an article about the return of “black market” fossils to China: Dinosaur Eggs Returned to China.

Government staff will face strict penalties if they illegally possess or fail to halt the taking away of fossils.  A spokesperson with the Legislative Affairs Office of the State Council stated that the regulation is more comprehensive than the Management Measures on the Protection of Palaeontology Fossils, China’s current regulation on fossil protection, which was enacted in 2002.

The new regulations are designed to provide more guidelines on the supervision, prohibition and penalties with regard to the over-exploitation and smuggling of fossils, an official commented.

PNSO of China have been developing a beautiful range of dinosaur and prehistoric animal models and figures.  Many of these figures represent iconic animals from China’s fossil heritage such as the ancient bird Confuciusornis.

The PNSO Confuciusornis Age of Dinosaurs Model

PNSO Confuciusornis model.  Models to reflect China's fossil heritage.

“A bird in the hand”, the Confuciusornis model from PNSO. Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

To view the range of PNSO models available from Everything Dinosaur: PNSO Museum Quality Dinosaur Models.

12 09, 2010

Glow in the Dark Dinosaurs – A Bright Idea for a Christmas Gift

By |2023-01-12T14:05:55+00:00September 12th, 2010|Dinosaur Fans, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Everything Dinosaur Products, Main Page|0 Comments

Glow in the Dark Jigsaw from Everything Dinosaur – Dinosaurs for Christmas

A busy Summer has been had by all at Everything Dinosaur, and now as we get into the middle of September all the products, toys and games that we have had on test are starting to be put in our warehouse ready for the Christmas rush.  Everything we stock has to get past our own very diligent team of dinosaur experts, who review books, games and toys and rate them for their educational benefits and creative play.  We then have our own team of pet testers who give us feedback on those products that they try out.

In amongst all the new items coming into our store is this delightful and unusual dinosaur themed jigsaw.

The Dinosaurs Alive Glow in the Dark Jigsaw

Glow in the dark dinosaur jigsaw puzzle.

A glow in the dark dinosaur jigsaw puzzle.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

To view a wide range of dinosaur themed toys and gifts available from Everything Dinosaur’s award-winning website: Visit Everything Dinosaur.

Dinosaur Jigsaw Puzzle

This colourful, 100 piece dinosaur jigsaw proved very popular with our testers.  They liked the lively dinosaur and prehistoric animal themed picture and appreciated the well-made and easy to fit together jigsaw pieces.  The real treat was when it got dark, as the picture glows at night and shows the skeletons of the animals.  The image glows in the dark and the likes of Tyrannosaurus rex, pterosaurs, Stegosaurus, Triceratops and even a small marine reptile are revealed – bones and all.  Buried in the picture are other fossils that can be seen after dark, hidden dinosaur bones, just like going on a real excavation.  This is a well-designed jigsaw puzzle with a glow in the dark twist that our testers loved.

Switch of the Lights and the Jigsaw Glows

Glow in the dark dinosaur jigsaw puzzle.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

We are not quite sure what geological formation the picture represents and it would make life a lot easier if we could find real glow in the dark dinosaur fossils, still this is an unusual and quirky jigsaw puzzle that ticked all the right boxes for our dinosaur fans who helped with the research.  What you might say is a “bright idea for a Christmas gift”.

11 09, 2010

More Proof Reading – Deep Joy

By |2023-01-12T14:00:10+00:00September 11th, 2010|Dinosaur Fans, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Main Page|0 Comments

Proof Reading – Dinosaurs in 3-D

This morning we have to complete some proof reading for a publisher.  Everything Dinosaur team members are enthusiastic about such projects, after all, we don’t want children to be misinformed about dinosaurs and prehistoric animals. We have been sent copies of a new dinosaur book aimed at children and we have been asked to check this over and correct any errors before it goes to print.  It is so much better to have to do this before the print run, rather than have to inform the printing house and the publisher that the book they have just printed has some errors.

Everything Dinosaur

Good job we have been recruited to carry out this work, our diligent team have found more than ten major errors and it is not even noon yet.  Hopefully, we can get this work completed and our report sent out this afternoon, then we can get on with the fun things such as finishing painting the warehouse!

Spotting Dinosaur Mistakes

Unfortunately, we come across many instances of errors when it comes to the Dinosauria.  Whilst we fully accept since no one has ever seen a living non-avian dinosaur, interpreting the fossil record can lead to some very vivid and imaginative reconstructions, but sadly many books for children are littered with spelling mistakes and factual inaccuracies.

Triceratops Information – Far from Accurate!

Triceratops mistakes!

Triceratops? Not very good quality teaching resources.  Sadly, errors involving the Dinosauria are all too common.  Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Team members at Everything Dinosaur take great care selecting the prehistoric animal themed items that make it onto our website.  For dinosaur toys and games approved by the teaching team at Everything Dinosaur: Dinosaur Toys and Gifts.

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