The Big Dinosaur Podcast

Episode 213 is all about Qantassaurus, a small, quick, bipedal herbivore from Australia.

We also interview Dustin Growick, the Senior Creative Consultant at Museum Hack at AMNH. He also hosts Caveat’s VERSUS in NYC and the popular YouTube channel The Dinosaur Show. Follow him on Instagram @dinosaurwhisperer or twitter @DustinGrowick

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In this episode, we discuss:

News:

• A new titanosaur from Argentina was named Baalsaurus source
• Two new pterosaurs were found with fossilized feathers—making a shared feathery ancestor between dinosaurs and pterosaurs slightly more likely source
• A new dinosaur trackway from East Sussex, England preserves at least 7 species among 85 tracks source
• Embryonic research of birds explains where two missing bones went as dinosaurs evolved into birds source
• New details on the first two dinosaur fossils found in Oregon source
• BBC explains hw a shepherd in South Africa found a massive dinosaur bonebed source
• Canadian Museum of Nature is preparing a large Triceratops skull source
• A Smithsonian article discusses the complexities of the dinosaur extinction source
• Mike Taylor and Matt Wedel from SV-Pow are writing a paper on Github source
• Ulsan, South Korea has a new Dinosaur Footprint Park source
• Das Praehistorium in Germany has a “Moby Dick” like Megalodon experience and dinosaur sculptures source
• The BoJack Horseman writer Jonny Sun posted a really unfortunate dinosaur toy that he won source
• Jurassic Park has now been added to the National Film Registry source
• The game Jurassic World Evolution has a new update, with three new dinosaurs you can have in your park source
• Jurassic World 3 will feature dinosaurs as more of an invasive species than Godzilla-like city-destroyers source

The dinosaur of the day: Qantassaurus

• Ornithopod that lived in the Cretaceous in what is now Australia (when it was south of the Antarctic Circle)
• Bipedal and herbivorous
• Lower jaw had ten teeth
• Based on relatives, would have had short thighs and long shins, and been a fast runner
• Probably ran away from predators, similar to a gazelle
• Had claws on feet, and a long tail stiffened by ossified tendons (helped with turning)
• About 6 ft (1.8 m) long
• Probably had a beak, and leaf-shaped teeth in the back
• Browser, probably ate ferns and other vegetation using its hands
• May have travelled in herds or flocks
• Lived in a polar region
• Probably lived in cold temperatures (21 to 37°F, or -6 to 5 °C), and coldest during polar nights, which lasted up to 3 months
• Probably adapted to survive the cold
• Relatives were active throughout the year (no hibernation)
• Dinosaur burrows, of possibly small ornithopods, have been found along the southern Victorian coast (could be Qantassaurus?)
• Found in 1996, as part of the Dinosaur Dreaming project (run by Monash University and the National Museum of Victoria)
• Found by Nicole Evered
• Described in 1999 by Patricia Vickers-Rich and Tom Rich (found near Inverloch)
• Only jaw fragments are known (based on the jaw fragments, probably had a short, stubby face)
• Holotype is of the left dentary of the lower jaw, with ten teeth
• Two other jaws have been referred to Qantassaurus (found in the same year, same site)
• Patricia said “the jaw is unique because it is short and stocky, whereas other jaws…are long and slender”
• Type species is Qantassaurus intrepidus
• Named after Qantas, the Australian airline, because it shipped fossils around Australia as part of the Great Russian Dinosaurs Exhibit between 1993 and 1996, and sponsored expeditions to South America and eastern Europe
• Name means “Qantas lizard”
• Species name means “intrepid” in Latin (refers to the harsh climate it lived in)
• May be up to six types of small ornithopods that lived in the Cretaceous in Australia, but only known from fragments
• Relatives include Atlascopcosaurus, Leaellynasaura
• First Victorian ornithopods were categorized as Hypsilophodontidae, based on similarities in the skull and tooth structure to hypsilophodontids found in Europe (but now thought to be a wastebasket taxon, so undergoing revision)
• Validity of Qantassaurus is under review (some think it is, others think there’s not enough diagnostic fossil material)

Fun Fact: We covered 42 new dinosaur species (so far) that were named this year.

Sponsors:

This episode is brought to you in part by TRX Dinosaurs, which makes beautiful and realistic dinosaur sculptures, puppets, and animatronics. You can see some amazing examples and works in progress on Instagram @trxdinosaurs

And by Indiana University Press. Their Life of the Past series is lavishly illustrated and meticulously documented to showcase the latest findings and most compelling interpretations in the ever-changing field of paleontology. Find their books at iupress.indiana.edu