Tag: crocodile
Episode 32 – The Changing Face of Crocodiles
Episode 32 – The Changing Face of Crocodiles INTRODUCTION TO GROWING UP – Every living thing grows up, and this episode of “Past Time” explores the evolution of the growing process. Specifically, we explore the evolution of growth in crocodiles, and how changes to the growing process at the earliest stages of crocodile development help produce the wide array of crocodile snout shapes we see today …
Filed under: Biology, Paleontology, alligator, biologist, bird, caiman, chicken, crocodile, crocodylia, development, dinosaur, embryo, fossil, paleontologist, skeleton, skull
Episode 24 – Dinosaurs and crocodiles in the Land Before Egypt!
Egyptian paleontology has a long and storied history, although much of it is focused on discoveries from the Cenozoic Era. Incredible fossils of early whales, primates, and other mammals have been discovered in Egypt since the beginning of the twentieth century, work that continues to this day. However, fossils from the Age of Reptiles are much harder to come by. Indeed, most of the fossils record …
Filed under: Africa, Cretaceous, Dinosaurs, Egypt, Paleontologists, crocodile, crocodyliform, dinosaur
A Tale of Two Crocs: Predators of Cretaceous Spain
I tried to google “crocodiles are living fossils,” to see just how commonly that expression was used in popular articles. There were indeed a few articles that referenced this idea, suggesting that croc fossils from 80 million years ago would look identical the skeletons they have today. However, most were news stories reporting various discoveries in the fossil history of crocodiles and their rel …
Filed under: Cretaceous, Ecology, Europe, Spain, competition, crocodile, dinosaur, ecosystem
Episode 8 Field Guide: Crocodiles are the Chomping Champions!
Fossils are the raw materials of paleontology, but if we want to know how an animal moved or ate, paleontologists, like Dr. Paul Gignac, need to study living animals, too. Dr. Gignac studies crocodylians, measuring their bite forces across species and as they grow up to figure out how the strongest bite in nature evolved. Using techniques drawn from mechanical engineering and physiology, Dr. Gigna …
Filed under: Cretaceous, Deinosuchus, Dinosaurs, Ecology, Field Guide, Functional Morphology, Paleobiology, Reptiles, alligator, biting, croc, crocodile, supercroc
Episode 6 Field Guide: Tiny Horses, Galloping Crocs, and Fossilized Jungles
Fossils can be pretty scrappy. The best, most complete stuff is usually put on display at museums and photographed for books and websites, but a vast majority of material collected by paleontologists are fragments: slivers of teeth, fragments of shells, and splinters of bone. Paleontologists are trained to glean as much as they can from the patchy record, but the fragments can still leave a lot of …
Filed under: Archaeopterygx, Cenozoic, China, Ecology, Eocene, Germany, Mammals, Messel, UNESCO, bat, bird, crocodile, dinosaur, ecosystem, feather, horse, jungle, pterosaur, reptile, snake
