Episode 408: A new tiny-armed, gigantic, megapredator. The amazingly complete new theropod, Meraxes gigas; More Deinonychus eating Tenontosaurus; the smallest ever ornithopod; dinosaur opals; and much more.

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News:

• A new carcharodontosaurid with tiny arms, Meraxes gigas, helps show that all large-headed carnivores had relatively small arms source
• Gastroliths and Deinonychus teeth have been found associated with April the Tenontosaurus source
• Scientists looked at the growth of the smallest (but not yet named) ornithopod that lived in what is now Spain source
• An opalized fossil may be a new dinosaur species source
• The Australian Opal Centre hosts an annual dinosaur fossil dig source
• Ubirajara is being returned to Brazil source
• Podokesaurus holyokensis became the official state dinosaur of Massachusetts source
• Delaware has a state dinosaur, Dryptosaurus source
• There are seven missing sculptures from Crystal Palace Dinosaurs source
• Lottie, the Triceratops statue from Louisville, Kentucky got a makeover source
• NBC is making a new natural history series show called Surviving Earth source
• Stephen Fry is hosting Dinosaur — with Stephen Fry, a four part series about dinosaurs in the Jurassic and Cretaceous source
• You can play Dinosaur Fossil Hunter on Steam source
• Games Radar published a list of the 10 best dinosaur games source

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The dinosaur of the day: Zapalasaurus

• Diplodocoid sauropod that lived in the Early Cretaceous in what is now Neuquén Province, Argentina (La Amarga Formation)
• Looked like other sauropods, with a long neck and tail, and columnar legs
• Probably had a long neck that it could swing in an arc like shape, to help it eat lots of plants from one spot
• Had neural spines that seemed short compared to other diplodocoids
• Caudal (tail) vertebrae doubled in length in the first 20 vertebrae
• Herbivorous
• Type species is Zapalasaurus bonapartei
• Described by Leonardo Salgado and others in 2006
• Fossils found in a 1995-1996 expedition, under direction of José Bonaparte
• Genus name is for the city of Zapala, which is about 50 mi (80 km) from where the fossils were found
• Genus name means “Zapala lizard”
• Species name in honor of José Bonaparte, who collected the fossils
• Holotype is an incomplete skeleton (vertebrae, parts of the femur and tibia, pubis, part of a rib, and more)
• Helps show there was more diversity than previously thought of basal diplodocoids
• Other animals that lived around the same time and place include Amargasaurus, Amargatitanis (sauropod), Ligabueino (theropod), stegosaurs, pterosaurs, crocodylomorphs, mammals

Fun Fact:

Some dinosaurs had “belly buttons”.

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