The Big Dinosaur Podcast

Episode 184 is all about Segisaurus, a small Jurassic theropod which was so small that it probably ate insects

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In this episode, we discuss:

News:

• New dinosaur named Bagualosaurus was found in southern Brazil and is the largest sauropodomorph from the Carnian to date
• A small Spinosaurus toe bone was found in Morocco from an individual that was probably less than 6 feet long
• Some new dinosaur tracks were found in Lake Powell in Utah
• A time lapse video of the installation dinosaur specimen at the Rhinegeist Brewery in Cincinnati, Ohio
• Field Station Dinosaurs officially opened last week, with their new Spinosaurus
• The Virginia Living Museum has a new exhibit, Destination: Dinosaur!
• Dino4Hire, was featured on WalesOnline
• In Corpus Christi, Texas there will be a Flintstones themed Pride event, for ages 18+ called “Disco 3000“
• A new website “The Fossil Records” explores the intersections between the worlds of paleontology and vinyl records
• Geek.com listed some of the best dinosaur T-shirts
• A new show called Yabba-Dabba Dinosaurs and will have Pebbles, Bamm Bamm, and Dino from The Flintstones
• Indiana Jones in Disney’s Animal Kingdom, in Florida may be adding dinosaurs
• A T. rex was floated down the river Thames in London as a promotion for Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom
• To commemorate the 25th anniversary of Jurassic Park, they released a Newsweek Special Edition: Jurassic Park
• Another Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom featurette was released
• Jurassic World: Alive (a Pokemon Go style mobile game) was released on iOS and Android

The dinosaur of the day: Segisaurus

• Featured in the Jurassic Park brochure
• Coelophysoid theropod that lived in the Jurassic in what is now Arizona
• Name means “Tsegi canyon lizard”
• Found in the Tsegi Canyon, in Arizona, and is the only dinosaur excavated from there
• Max Littlesalt and Robert Thomas found Segisaurus in 1933, in sandstone (Max kept livestock in the canyon where it was found, and pointed out the fossils to archeologists who were on an expedition)
• Probably buried in sand and then died, based on being found in sandstone
• Lived in something similar to modern sand dunes
• Tracks are more common in the formation than skeletons
• Described in 1936 by Charles Lewis Camp
• Found parts of the limb, pelvis, and vertebrae (no skull)
• Type species is Segisaurus halli
• Found a sub-adult
• About 3.3 ft (1m) long (probably grew bigger)
• Weighed about 9-15 lb (4-7 kg)
• Ate insects, may have also scavenged for meat
• Primitive, bipedal
• Had long tail, long forearms, and long, powerful legs, with three toes
• Found in a roosting position, similar to modern birds
• Camp said its posture was like a “sitting hen” the way it was found. May have been in that position because it was sleeping or sheltering from sand and ash storms
• Bird like, with a long neck and stout body
• Found fused clavicles, which have not been found in other dinosaurs that lived at the same time
• Charles Lewis Camp said it may have had a “splint-like” neck to support a fold of skin that may have helped it move quickly
• Segisaurus shows that clavicle was in early theropods (interesting because there was debate in the 1930s whether dinosaurs had shoulder girdle bones, and how birds evolved)
• Gerhard Heilmann, a Danish artist and paleontologists, published The Origin of Birds in 1926. He argued that though many dinosaurs looked bird-like, they did not have clavicles (precursors to wishbones) and they seemed ot have lost them over time, and could not have re-evolved them. So he said that thecodonts (crocodylian types) where ancestors to birds and dinosaurs, and the shared ancestry was why there appeared to be convergent evolution between dinosaurs and birds. Many paleontologists agreed with this until the Dinosaur Renaissance of the 1970s
• Unfortunately, Segisaurus was largely ignored for many years (wasn’t reexamined until 2005), so didn’t play a role in the Dinosaur Renaissance
• Seems related to Coelophysis, but it was thought to have had solid bones instead of hollow bones
• Some scientists were unsure if it was a theropod because of its solid bones
• The re-examination in 2005 found that it did have hollow bones, and it was a coelophysoid, probably closely related to Procompsognathus

Fun Fact:

Dinosaur in mandarin is 恐龙 (Kǒnglóng) literally translates to afraid-dragon (or scary dragon) similar to Dinosaur which literally means terrible-lizard (or could be scary lizard)

This episode was brought to you by:

TRX Dinosaurs, which makes beautiful and realistic dinosaur sculptures, puppets, and exhibits. You can see some amazing examples and works in progress on Instagram @trxdinosaurs.

Enter to win a TRX Dinosaurs-made 1:1 scale Velociraptor sculpture. It’s open to anyone in the US or Canada (except Quebec) ages 18 and older to win. Complete rules are at https://iknowdino.com/velociraptor-sculpture-sweepstakes-official-rules

This week’s link to enter is http://bit.ly/Dinosaur184