The Big Dinosaur Podcast

Episode 135 is all about Siats, a dinosaur named after a predatory, man-eating monster in Ute Native American mythology.

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In this episode, we discuss:

News:

• Researchers 3D printed a life size flexible Australovenator foot, then added soft tissues based on emu feet to create new footprints in PeerJ
• Another new troodontid discovery from China Daliansaurus liaoningensis with tiny serrated teeth, published in Geologica Sinica
• Adding to the feathered tail and wings in amber, we now have most of an early bird preserved in amber, published in Gondwana Research
• Gregory Paul made a case for rearing sauropods in a new paper published in The Anatomical Record
• A fossil found in 1965 has been recently confirmed to be a dinosaur egg according to Japan Times
• The first theropod skull has been found in British Columbia according to CBC
• A new dinosaur from Dinosaur Provincial Park will be named after the paleontologist’s mother also on CBC
• John Scannella has been officially named the “John R. Horner Curator of Paleontology” at the Museum of the Rockies
• Some in Fresno are hoping that the new fame of Augustynolophus will bring more science interest to its home town according to The Fresno Bee
• Bears Ears (near the Rainbows and Unicorns site) was proclaimed a national monument and may contain early dinosaurs according to Inside Science
• Scott Persons described Canadian and Mongolian Saurolophines whose scales may show spotted and striped patterns respectively on CBC
• Dinosaur Home shared the complicated history of Dravidosaurus in India and the possibility for Cretaceous stegosaurs
• More than a Dodo detailed the early history of dinosaurs and how modern scientists study them
• SVPOW shared a Google Doc by Gunna Bivens which aims to list as many dinosaur specimens as possible
• The Institute for the Study of Mongolian Dinosaurs clarified the difference between Velociraptor and Utahraptor
• The Natural History Museum of Utah posted about their Cleveland-Lloyd exhibit, in response to all the recent hype
• Blooloop featured Dinosaurs in the Wild and Tim Haines who led the creative direction of the exhibit
• The Wollaton Hall in Nottingham, UK had to shut down for a couple weeks to get ready of a large dinosaur exhibit from China according to BBC
• The Museums of Western Colorado hosted the 30th Annual Dinosaur Day at their Dinosaur Journey location according to Western Slope Now
• The University of Kansas is working with students and volunteers to excavate a T. rex in Montana this summer
• The Wyoming Dinosaur Center is hosting a week of paleontology programs this July for high school students according to Cody Enterprise
• The North Dakota Geological Survey is hosting four events this summer all around the state according to Bismarck Tribune
• The Philip J Currie Dinosaur Museum is offering regular tours to the Pipestone Creek bonebed, and a free monthly lecture series according to Daily Herald Tribune
• Louisville, Kentucky may have a $80 million aquarium and dinosaur park as soon as 2021 according to LEX18
• DawnDinos is working with the students at the City of London Academy to make dinosaurs from clay, collage, origami, and art-straws
• The Denver Zoo and the Denver Museum of Nature and Science both have temporary dinosaur attractions coming up
• The Natural History Museum in London gave a live tour (which is available here) including footage behind the scenes
• The Morrison Natural History Museum is displaying the hatchling Stegosaurus and Apatosaurus footprints according to The Pueblo Chieftain
• Extinct Monsters tried to analyze if museums over represent Dinosaur fossils, spoiler alert… they don’t
• Transmitting Science is offering a scientific illustration course in Barcelona, Spain
• Kotlas, Russia, opened a new park full of life sized dinosaur and other prehistoric sculptures on June 10 according to RBTH
• The LEGO house in Billund, Denmark will feature three giant T. rex models from DUPLO, TECHNIC and SYSTEM according to brothers-brick
• Gamespot is reporting that Jurassic World 2 will be a Spanish horror thriller based on comments by Colin Trevorrow
• SVPOW hypothesized that sauropods may have stomped on turtles to get some quick protein and calcium
• Nerdist showed Artist Chris Rodley’s creations of a neural network that takes illustrations of dinosaurs and redesigns them as flowers and fruit
• Love in the Time of Chasmosaurs shared artist Gabriel Ugueto’s posters of dinosaurs and other paleofauna by geological formation
• Science Comics: Dinosaurs is up for the Eisner Awards for comics this year according to The Beat
• The new book Dad and the Dinosaur by Gennifer Choldenko and Dan Santat features a father, son, & dinosaur story according to NWI
• Another new book, Tiny Dinosaurs by Joel Stewart features a young girl finding dinosaurs in her yard according to The Gaurdian
• Super Mario Odyssey on the Nintendo Switch will feature a playable T. rex according to Kotaku
• One Toronto Raptors fan on Reddit, doritopope, said he would tattoo a dinosaur on his butt if the Raptors didn’t get Paul George according to Bleacher Report
• Twenty Two Words reported on a failed attempt by @SUEtheTrex to start a feud with @MerriamWebster

The dinosaur of the day: Siats

• Megaraptoran theropod that lived in the Late Cretaceous in what is now Utah, U.S.
• Name comes from Siats, a predatory, man-eating monster in Ute Native American mythology
• Only one species: Siats meekerorum
• Species name is in honor of John Caldwell Meeker, a geologist who bequeathed a fund for paleontological research at the Field Museum in Chicago, as well as his wife Withrow Meeker, and his daughter, Lis Meeker
• Described and named by Lindsay Zanno and Peter Makovicky in 2013
• Lindsay Zanno found Siats in a 2008 expedition of the Field Museum, led by Peter Makovicky. They collected it between 2008 and 2010
• Possibly the first neovenatorid found in North America and the youngest (geologically) allosauroid
• Holotype consists of a partial postcranial skeleton (vertebrae, a chevron, partial right ilium, ischium and fibular, partial left tibia, some pedal phalanges).
• Holotype is now at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago
• Holotype is of a juvenile (neural arches of vertebrae were not fused, so it wasn’t fully grown)
• No cranial materials found, except for some teeth, so how its skull looked is based on relatives
• Possibly had a pointy-ish head
• Had long, three-clawed arms
• May have had large claws (not found, but based on close relatives such as Australovenator, Fukuiraptor, Aerosteon, and Megaraptor)
• One of the largest known theropods in North America
• Zanno and Mackovicky estimated its to be up to 39 ft (12 m) long and weighing about 4 tons
• May have been similar in size to Saurophaganax and Acrocanthosaurus
• If size estimates are correct, Siats would have been one of the largest predators found in North America
• May have been an apex predator
• If Siats is a neovenatorid, Siats shows that allosauroids still dominated North America (not tyrannosauroids) until the Late Cretaceous. But until last year, there was a lot of debate of how to classify megaraptors (they were either neovenatorids or tyrannosaroids). Studies of other megaraptorans have shown they are carnosaurs that had tyrannosaroid-like features, via convergent evolution
• Early tyrannosaurs, that lived at the time of Siats, would have been small
• When Siats lived, most herbivores were hadrosaroids and nodosaurs, but shortly after Siats, ceratopsians and ankylosaurs started thriving, and they would have been too hard for Siats to handle. This may be what allowed tyrannosaurs to grow and thrive (they were more suited to tackling these tougher prey animals)

Fun Fact:

Plant fossils are much more common than fossilized bones, but the two are very rarely found together.

• Not because they didn’t get buried together
• Bones are preserved best in alkaline (basic) soil
• Plants are preserved best in acidic soil

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