Dinosaurs,

Where Are They Now?

Jocelyn van Hees

 TABLE OF CONTENTS

01 MASS EXTINCTION
The end of dinosaurs?
BIRDS!
The most evolved species
on Earth !
03
02 BONE WARS
Who was the first
paleontologist?
WHAT NOW?
The future for dinosaurs
and paleontologists.
What is left?
04
01
Mass
Extinction
 Mass Extinctions 99.9% of all things that have ever lived
are extinct !

01 02 03
Ordovician-silurian Devonian Extinction Permian-triassic
Trilobites! Extinction Extinction

440 million years ago.
Small marine organisms
died out.
365 million years ago.
Many tropical marine
species went extinct.
250 million years ago. The
largest mass extinction event
in Earth's history affected a
range of species, including
many vertebrates.

figure? : permian-extinction
figure ?: devonian
 04 05
02
Triassic-jurassic Cretaceous-tertiary
Extinction Extinction

210 million years ago. 65 million years ago. Wiped

The extinction of other out some 50 percent of
vertebrate species on land plants and animals.
allowed dinosaurs to
flourish.

figure?: cretaceous-tertiary extinction

figure ?: triassic-jurassic extinction
 Paleo (meaning old) onto (m. being)
What is a palaeontology? → Essentially, “palaeontology” is the
study of old beings

To be considered a fossil, it must be at LEAST 10,000 years old.

A fossil is a trace or remain or cast of a left impression of something that

was once alive.

Latin translation for fossil:

‘obtained by digging’
Where do Palaeontologists find dinosaurs? If you’re lucky, the bones will all be
articulated:
Meaning all found in the same place.
Digging

01 Sedimentary Rock
The region must include sedimentary rock
layers: Limestone, Sandstone.

02 That is Exposed
These sedimentary rock layers need
to be exposed on the surface.

03 And the Right Age

The sedimentary rock layers
need to have been formed
while dinosaurs were alive
(230-66 million years ago).
Why can’t you find
dinosaur bones in
Ottawa?

Mafic rocks are igneous, i.e. of

volcanic origin, rocks rich in
iron and magnesium. You
don’t find any fossils in
igneous rocks (at least not
commonly - there are a
handful of exceptions), let
alone dinosaurs.

Geology and Principal

Minerals of Ontario
 Museums

Armatures:

Metal cradles that holds the bones in place

externally.

More importantly, you no longer need to drill the

heck out of fossils to wire them together, which is
very old school.

Figure 5: national geographic

 02
BONE WARS
Just a couple old men
settling a feud over some
cadavers.

figure ?
 $$ vs $$

Othniel Charles Marsh and

Edward Drinker Cope had a
mutual hated for each other.
They tried to outdo each other
in terms of paleon theological
supremacy.

Othniel C. Marsh and

Edward D. Cope (r. to l.)

Figure ?: pbs

O.C. Marsh and E.D. Cope
would sabotage each
other’s work and publicly
discredit the other one.
One of them, Marsh, put the
wrong skull on an
apatosaurus and called it a
Brontosaurus.
Old men
part 2
The original material that
was named Brontosaurus
was later found to be
comprised of multiple
animals of different species,
so it was decided that
Brontosaurus was not a
valid name.

Their rivalry lead to both of them going

broke.

Bottom line: (Duh, you can’t combine

known stuff and call it a new animal)
BIRDS !
Cah caw
Dinosaurs taste like chicken.

File genetic bracket tastiness . Your typical dinosaur

would be more dark meat than white meat.
What turns the meat dark is myoglobin: storing
oxygen in muscle in aerobic muscles (high
endurance muscle).

Oxygen storing protein, myoglobin, is what makes

meat ‘dark’. This is why chicken legs, (that move
around more), are dark and chicken breast, (which Land Before Time©
sits there not flapping), is white.

Good luck looking at a roasted dinosaur again :)

 Where Are Dinosaurs Now?

Birds are the most

evolved species on
Earth (even more so
than humans)!

01 03
The Great Blue Heron The Cassowary
The cassowary is found only in
Great blue herons are Canada's most The Shoebill Stork the tropical rainforests of
widespread heron, and are found
Shoebill or whale-headed storks are endemic north-east Queensland, Papua
from the Maritimes to British
to Africa and inhabit the east-central part of New Guinea and some
Columbia. Most of the Canadian
the continent. The main populations are surrounding islands.
population of this species is here
only during the breeding season. found in southern Sudan/Congo.
 Boss
Dinosaurs
How big is a big dinosaur?
The Guardian
 Titanosaurus :

Comparing our ~ The largest dinosaur

uncovered to date in (what is now)
fav dinos Patagonia, Argentina.

A big bull african elephant, which is the largest living

land animal, weighs 5 tons (average).

A big Titanosaurus is regular hitting 60 tons (twelve

times as big as the biggest animal alive).

BBC
 The first Triceratops was
Triceratops discovered by our lovely
O.C. Marsh.

5’6 10’

1’6 26’
 The first Stegosaurus fossil was found
in Colorado, USA, in 1876 by M. P.
Felch.
Stegosaurus
And later named, by Marsh (again)

5’6 13’

1’6 29’5
 Tyrannosaurus Rex

5’6 18’

1’6
40’
 More on
In 1902 Barnum Brown, working for the
American Museum of Natural History
(AMNH), was led to some bones eroding
out of the earth by a local land owner.

t-rex
These bones turned out to be something
not seen before near Hell Creek in
Montana. It was a large theropod with a
huge skull and giant teeth. It took a full 3
years to excavate the beast.

In 1905 when it was fully excavated (all

10% of it), Barnum transported the
specimen to Osborn, the paleontology
curator at the AMNH. There, Osborn
studied and described it. He named it This is Image # 28767 from the American
Tyrannosaurus rex (Tyrant Lizard King). Museum of Natural History
 What they think the
t-rex actually looked
like, (100x scarier).

Scientists have found evidence

of melanin:

The same pigment found in

human skin and the feathers of
some modern birds. Like hawks
and eagles today, the T-Rex
probably had patches of brown,
black and grey.

CBC.ca/Nature of Things
 watch watch watch

Dilophosaurus AKA, my favourite, thanks to Dennis ->

The Dilophosaurus was first discovered in
1942 by Sam Welles. It has been discovered in
both America and China, which means it must
have had a large range. It was first described
in 1954 and later named Dilophosaurus
(Two-crested Lizard) because of its head
crests.

5’6 6’

1’6 19’5
 What
Now?
Will palaeontologists run
Jurassic Park ©
out of dinosaurs?
There is still so much more.
Just last month (FEBRUARY 12, 2021), The Washington Post
released an article, “The pandemic has left a huge cache of
dinosaur bones stuck in the Sahara”. Where in patches of the
south-central Sahara, blankets of sand hide 20 tons of dinosaur
bones. -> Washington Post

Furthermore, scientists are constantly discovering different

species of organisms and dinosaurs from 228-66 million
years ago.
Palaeontology is highly relevant to the
modern and future world.

We can learn how climate change has

affected past organisms as well as how
organisms have changed the physical world.
We can also better understand the principles
of extinction, evolutionary change, and
biodiversity.

One thing is for certain, Palaeontology is

going to be around for a long time.
THANK YOU FOR
LISTENING !
 PODCASTS I LISTENED TO :
SOURCES: ● “Ologies” - Episode 3:
VIDEOS I WATCHED : Paleontology with Alie Ward and
Youtube: American Museum of Natural History Michael Habib
Youtube: Tech Insider

PHOTOS: ARTICLES I READ :

● Slide no. 4:figure 1: ordovician-silurian ● pbs : O.C. Marsh and E.D.
● Slide no. 4:figure 2: devonian Cope: A Rivalry
● mass extinction: American
● Slide no. 4:figure 3 : permian-extinction Museum of Natural History
● Slide no. 5:figure 4: triassic-jurassic extinction ● PBS: Crocodiles &
● Slide no. 5: figure?: cretaceous-tertiary extinction Dinosaurs
● Washington Post
● Slide no. 7 (figure 5): national geographic ● CBC.ca/Nature of Things
● Slide no. 10: Geology and Principal Minerals of Ontario ● discovery of the t-rex
● Slide no. 19: The Guardian
● Slide no. 20: BBC ●