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The Big Dinosaur Podcast

The Big Dinosaur Podcast

A site about dinosaurs

Episode 359: The “butterfly hunter” troodontid

Episode 359 is all about Colepiocephale, the “knucklehead” pachycephalosaurid from the Late Cretaceous of Canada.

We also interview Dave and Iszi, join us from the Terrible Lizards podcast. We chat about the origin of their show and all their other projects. We were also a guest on their podcast last week at terriblelizards.co.uk

Big thanks to all our patrons! Your support means so much to us and keeps us going! If you’re a dinosaur enthusiast, join our growing community on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/iknowdino.

You can listen to our free podcast, with all our episodes, on Apple Podcasts at: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/i-know-dino/id960976813?mt=2

In this episode, we discuss:

News:

  • A new “short-snouted” troodontid, Papiliovenator, was named from Inner Mongolia source
  • The Fernbank Museum has the Antarctic Dinosaurs traveling exhibit until January 2 source
  • Sabrina reviews the new Flintstones spinoff named Yabba-Dabba Dinosaurs source

The dinosaur of the day: Colepiocephale

  • Pachycephalosaurid that lived in the Late Cretaceous in what is now Alberta, Canada (Foremost Formation) and Montana, US (Judith River Formation)
  • Herbivorous
  • May have been prey for Thanatotheristes degrootorum (“Reaper of Death”), talked about in episode 273
  • Type species is Colepiocephale lambei
  • Genus name means “knucklehead”
  • Holotype includes part of the dome of the skull
  • Originally described by Sternberg in 1945 as Stegoceras lambei
  • Renamed by Robert Sullivan in 2003 to Colepiocephale
  • Sullivan did a phylogenetic analysis with 49 characters of multiple pachycephalosaurs, and found Colepiocephale to be a new genus
  • Unique enough in the posterior squamosal region (bumps at the back of the head)
  • At the time, Colepiocephale was the oldest diagnostic pachycephalosaur from North America. There was an older skull from the Milk River Formation but it was too incomplete and indeterminate to name the type of pachycephalosaur
  • In 2009 Ryan Schott and others analyzed Colepiocephale, including the holotype and a referred part of a dome found in the Judith River Formation of Montana
  • Reaffirmed Colepiocephale was its own genus based on several autapomorphies and being in a different stratigraphy from Stegoceras validum (lived at a different time)
  • There were three previous hypotheses that 1) it was synonymous with Stegoceras validum, 2) it was its own species within Stegoceras, or 3) it was more derived than Stegoceras

Fun Fact: Our dinosaur map has museums from 47 countries and 45/50 US states (let us know what we’re missing).

Sponsors:

This episode is brought to you by Prehistoric Pets, the new pop-up book by paleontologist Dr. Dean Lomax, illustrated by Mike Love. Prehistoric Pets takes a close look at 7 favorite pets and uses fossil clues to reveal who their prehistoric ancestors might have been. Pick up your copy at candlewick.com/r/prehistoricpets-dino

I Know Dino Podcast Show Notes: Stygimoloch (Episode 176)

Episode 176 is all about Stygimoloch, a dinosaur with awesome spikes around the back of its head which some think is a juvenile Pachycephalosaurus.

Thank you! Thank you to all our patrons! Your support means so much to us and keeps us going! If you’re a dinosaur enthusiast, join our growing community on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/iknowdino.

You can listen to our free podcast, with all our episodes, on iTunes at:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/i-know-dino/id960976813?mt=2

In this episode, we discuss:

News:

  • A new paper demonstrates that ceratopsians probably didn’t evolve horns and frills to recognize one another
  • A very questionable hypothesis suggests that dinosaurs may not have been able to identify poison and accidentally started to drive themselves extinct
  • Newly described material helps to support the claim that Paranthodon was a stegosaur
  • Students at the University of Kansas recently excavated a possible young T. rex from the Hell Creek Formation in Montana
  • The North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh, North Carolina, recently unveiled a clutch of oviraptorosaur eggs
  • The Philip J. Currie Museum in Alberta is launching a “Paleontologist For A Day” program this summer
  • The Bess Bower Dunn Museum near in Libertyville, Illinois (near Chicago), has a new life sized Dryptosaurus to welcome visitors
  • Yorkshire Museum in the UK has a new VR exhibit called Yorkshire’s Jurassic World
  • This summer, Milwaukee County Zoo in Wisconsin will have dinosaur summer camps
  • Colin Dunn from the Bureau of Land Management leads Saturday morning hikes to Prehistoric Trackways National Monument
  • In Essex, in the UK, there’s a new tourist attraction, an 18 hole mini golf course called Mighty Claws Adventure Golf
  • In Portland, Oregon, a demolition machine decorated to look like a dinosaur tore down an old dentistry building.
  • ScreenRant published that Jurassic World struggles to make dinosaurs scary, we think they’re just not trying hard enough
  • Think Geek‘s April Fool’s joke featured a “Jurassic World Dinosaur Detection System”
  • Mattel is selling a huge assortment of Jurassic World and Jurassic Park toys, Walmart seems to be the main place to get them at the moment

The dinosaur of the day: Stygimoloch

  • An official Snapchat post for Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom confirmed that Stygimoloch will be in the movie
  • Pachycephalosaurid that lived in the Cretaceous in what is now the U.S. (found in the Hell Creek Formation, Ferris Formation, and Lance Formation)
  • Several individuals have been found
  • Described in 1983 by Peter Galton and Hans-Dieter Sues
  • Type species is Stygimoloch spinifer
  • Name means “Styx demon” and the name comes from the river Styx, which ran through the underworld in Greek mythology, as well as Moloch, the name of a Canaanite god, because it looked so bizarre
  • Herbivore that may have been about 10 ft or over 3 m long
  • Lived at the same time and place as Tyrannosaurus and Triceratops
  • Had an unusual looking skull
  • Had clusters of spikes on the back of the skull, with one long, central horn, surrounded by 2-3 smaller horns
  • Had short hornlets on its nose, and a pair of large backward pointing spikes on the back corners of its skull (not sure what it was used for)
  • Had a relatively small, flattened dome, so probably did not do much head butting
  • Skull ornamentation may have been for display, defense, or for shoving matchings (locking horns, like deer), or to inflict pain when butting flanks
  • One article referenced a Stygimoloch skull that was on auction in New York a few years back, but couldn’t find out what happened to it, or who ended up buying it
  • Part of a controversy
  • In 2009, Mark Goodwin and Jack Horner published a paper arguing that Pachycephalosaurus, Stygimoloch, and Dracorex were all Pachycephalosaurus, representing a growth series (proposed the idea at SVP in 2007). They considered Dracorex to be the juvenile, though Bob Bakker and others in 2006 had determined the Dracorex specimen to be an adult, based on the ornamentation on its skull and fused bones
  • Also, Williamson and Carr in 2002 agreed with Goodwin and others from a paper in 1998 that found these three taxa to be distinct based on horn size and head shape (Pachycephalosaurus had a larger, more round skull, Stygimoloch has longer horns and a narrower dome)
  • Dracorex (named in 2006) did not have a dome, had large horns, and large temporal holes in the skull
  • Horner argued that we don’t know exactly how big or how old any dinosaur species could get, and that juvenile skulls can look very different from adult skulls
  • The idea for lumping the three together was that long, sharp horns grew out of the back of the head for the first half of the dinosaur’s life, and then the horns were reduced as it reached maturity, and as the horns shrunk, the flat forehead grew and expanded into a solid dome. Also, the large openings in the skull closed when it aged. Dracorex would be a half-grown juvenile, Stygimoloch would be three-quarters grown, and Pachycephalosaurus would be an adult
  • Covered Pachycephalosaurus in episode 93
  • Bob Bakker said he has studied horn and dome growth in modern animals that butt heads and none of them show a reversal of horn development (same goes for well known horned dinosaurs, though Triceratops horns do grow larger and its skull changes a lot during growth). He also said they looked at a juvenile Pachycephalosaurus skull, about 2/3 the length of an adult skull, and that it had a very similar shape to the adult Pachycephalosaurus skull, with small horns, no holes in the skull, and a large dome. The skull is similar in size to the Dracorex skull found, but the two skulls look very different
  • Bob Bakker said he and a team compared Stygimoloch specimens with Dracorex and found their skulls were similar in size, so the differences in their skulls weren’t due to age differences (ontogenetic development)
  • He also said these pachycephalosaur dinosaurs (including Pachycephalosaurus, Stygimoloch, and Dracorex), probably all grew like Triceratops, where bumps and horns got bigger as they aged, but not growth reversal
  • Pete Larson posted photos of the Stygimolch he was working on between October 2016 and June 2017. Said he found enough differences in the skull to make Stygimoloch a distinct genus (though couldn’t find a paper of his findings, maybe not ready?) He found a pathology on the “longest” horn on the left squamosal (bacterial infection), stapes (bone in the middle ear) the first recognized disarticulated vomer in a pachycephalosaur (small thin bone that separates left and right nasal cavities), and elements of the scholortic ring that was around both its eyes
  • A comment in one of the papers said there’s a complication, in that a pachycephalosaur skull found in the same quarry where Sue the T. rex was excavated was about the same size as the Dracorex and Stygimoloch skulls found, with a dome size that was in the middle of the two (could show the ontogeny). But it short spiked nodes on the back of its head instead of long spikes, similar to adult Pachycephalosaurus. This could mean the long spikes vary within Pachycephalosaurus (seems to be variation in Pachycephalsaurus squamosal) or they are a distinct feature of Stygimoloch. Also, Pachycephalosaurus and Stygimoloch specimens were found in different stratigraphies, though this type of data was not really collected for historical Pachycephalosaurus specimens (would need more data)
  • Nick Longrich and others published a study in 2010 that suggested all flat-skulled pachycephalosaurs were juveniles
  • Need more fossils
  • Quote from Bob Bakker: “The key to accurate interpretations of a fossil species is to be prepared to be surprised; do not assume that all the ancient creatures and ecosystems fit neatly into the ecological typecasting of modern species.”

Fun Fact:

Paranthodon (Pah-RAN-tha-don) africanus was the first dinosaur discovered in Africa.

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/Velociraptor176

And by the Royal Tyrrell Museum, which is located in southern Alberta, Canada. Right now they are hosting their free-to-attend Winter speaker series (also on YouTube). More information can be found at tyrrellmuseum.com.

I Know Dino Podcast Show Notes: Stegoceras (Episode 41)

Episode 41 is all about Stegoceras, a pachycephalosaurid with a smooth domed head.

Also, another big thank you to our first  Patreon supporters! We are incredibly grateful to all our listeners. If you enjoy our free weekly podcast and are interested in learning more about I Know Dino on Patreon, then please check out our Patreon page at:

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You can listen to our free podcast, with all our episodes, on iTunes at:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/i-know-dino/id960976813?mt=2

In this episode, we discuss:

  • The dinosaur of the day: Stegoceras, whose name means “horned roof”
  • Pachycephalosaurid dinosaur that lived in North America during the Late Cretaceous
  • First named in 1902, by Lawrence Lambe
  • Bones first found in 1889
  • When Stegoceras was first found, scientists thought the bones were belly ribs, which are not found in other ornithischians (but now thought to be ossified tendons
  • Type species is Stegoceras validum (based on 40 specimens found in the Belly River Group of Alberta, Canada)
  • Between the 1920s to 1945, Stegoceras was thought to be Troodon, because they had similar teeth (but then better specimens were found)
  • Used to be more Stegoceras species, such as Stegoceras lambei, Stegoceras sternbergi, and Stegoceras breve, but were later assigned to other genera
  • In 1983 Stegoceras browni was renamed Ornatotholus, but is now considered to be a juvenile of S. validum
  • One genus, Ornatotholus, is thought to be a juvenile Stegoceras validum, based on an analysis of the cranial dome ontogeny
  • 2011 PLOS ONE Cranial Ontogeny in Stegoceras validum (Dinosauria: Pachycephalosauria): A Quantitative Model of Pachycephalosaur Dome Growth and Variation”: study that shows the skull changed with age and Ornatotholus browni is a juvenile of S. validium
  • In 1990, Mark Goodwin described the skull of an adult Stegoceras, but the skull was large for a Stegoceras. In 2003, Robert Sullivan wrote a review of the fossils found, and thought it was distinct enough to be named Hanssuesia sternbergi. But a more recent study by Ryan Schott and David Evans argues the skull is an adult Stegoceras, even though it lacked nodes in the back of the skull which is seen on younger Stegoceras (not sure why it doesn’t have the nodes, possible they just changed with age)
  • In 2011, a new valid species was named by Steven E. Jasinski and Robert M. Sullivan, called Stegoceras novomexicanum, based on two partial skulls
  • Stegoceras novomexicanum was only about 4 feet long, compared to S. valdium which was over 6 feet long
  • Stegoceras is a more common, better known pachycephalosaur
  • Part of the group Marginocephalia and Pachycephalosauria
  • Probably evolved from Hypsilophodon (from episode 28)
  • Bones have been found in Alberta Canada and New Mexico
  • About 6.6 ft (2 m) long and weighed 22-88 lb (10-40 kg)
  • About 4 ft or 1.2 m tall
  • Bipedal
  • May have gone on all four feet to look for plants to eat
  • Had small teeth that were curved, with serrated edges (again, similar to Troodon)
  • Had legs three times longer than arms
  • Had an S- or U-shaped neck
  • Stegoceras had round forward facing eye sockets, so probably had good vision and binocular vision
  • Probably a herding dinosaur
  • Other dinosaurs that lived by Stegoceras were Albertosaurus, Maiasaura, T-rex, Ankylosaurus, Parasaurolophus, Corythosaurus and Dryptosaurus
  • Had a large brain that was in a thick dome about 3 in or 7.5 cm thick (and divided into two parts)
  • The dome was smooth
  • Males had thicker domes than females (so did older Stegoceras)
  • In 1981 the Journal of Paleontology published “A Morphometric Study of the Carnium of the Pachycephalosaurid Dinosaur Stegoceras” which measured the braincases of 29 specimens and found that what was once thought to be two types of Stegoceras was just male and female (males had thicker domes than females)
  • Scientists originally thought male Stegoceras rammed their heads together (like bighorn sheep or musk oxen), but in 1997 some paleontologists said the dome was not large enough for that kind of impact, and would not have worked unless the heads hit at just the right spot; also, their head, neck and body would have had to be in a horizontal line to transmit stress, but scientists think their necks were S- or U-shaped; an alternative is flank-butting, which involves moving the neck and rotating the head and not seriously injure the opponent (bone rim above the eye may have protected its eyes)
  • Mark Goodwin from University of California Berkeley analyzed pachycephalosaur skulls and found no evidence of healed scars, and found hat the skull bone is porous and fragile under pressure, so they would have killed each other in fights
  • In 2011 Eric Snively and Theodor analyzed CT scans of Stegoceras validum skulls, and found they could have head-butted, based on an extra layer of dense bone in the middle of the dome, which would have been extra protection
  • Eric Snively and researched published a study in 2011 in PLOS One  called”Common Functional Correlates of Head-Strike Behavior in the Pachycephalosaur Stegoceras validum (Ornithischia, Dinosauria) and Combative Artiodactyls” that showed Stegoceras could have head butted
  • They did CT scans on modern animal skulls and Stegoceras, then made a virtual simulation showing beasts going head to head
  • Found its brain was more protected than bighorn sheep and musk ox
  • Stegoceras had an extra layer of dense bone in the middle of its dome, in addition to a stiff rind outside with spongy material that can absorb energy (and keep them conscious when butting heads)
  • Eric Snively said there are “alternating layers of stiff and compliant bone in the domes…almost as if they are wearing a double motorcycle helmet”
  • May have butted heads to attract mates
  • The study of Stegoceras that found the domes could dissipate impact forces doesn’t prove they rammed heads, they may have flanked each other by swinging their heads into each others sides instead
  • Stegoceras was a heavy breather
  • In 2014 Anatomical Record published Jason Bourke and his team’s study that showed Stegoceras cooled its brain by breathing
  • It breathed like a bird or reptile and took long, deep breaths, based on a CT scan by Jason Bourke and colleagues (breathing helped cool its brain by cooling blood vessels in the brain; also may have not had nose hairs like modern reptiles so would have had lots of mucous to avoid inhaling small, airborne objects
  • Dinosaurs did not have nose hairs (needed mucous)
  • Bourke and colleagues scanned the Stegoceras skull and found the turbinates
  • Jason Bourke from the University of Ohio found that Stegoceras had turbinates, intricate structures in their nose, to help cool blood and prevent water loss
  • They ran virtual air through a 3D model of the dinosaur’s nose to see how the turbinates altered airflow
  • That’s how they found it acted as a cooling system, where the air breathed in cooled the warm blood inside before flowing to the brain (helped them keep cool when running away from predators)
  • Because dinosaurs were so large, overheating was a major issue
  • Stegoceras is a relatively small dinosaur, but still cooled its brain
  • Had a good sense of smell, to sniff out predators, mates, and food
  • Marginocephalia (“fringed heads”) is a clade of ornithiscians that were herbivores (both bipedal and quadrupedal), with bony ridges of frills at the back of the skull; lived in Jurassic and Cretaceous
  • Pachycephalosauria (“thick headed lizards”) is also a clade of ornithiscians; lived in the late Cretaceous in North America and Asia
  • Pachycephalosaurs were herbivores with thick skulls
  • They were all bipedal
  • Had thick skulls
  • Some had domed skulls, others flat or wedge shaped
  • Fun Fact: The phaeomelanosomes that potentially stored pigments in dinosaurs’ red feathers is the same as the pigment that makes Garret’s hair red!

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