12 dinosaur misconceptions you should stop believing

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

Famous films have created a spectacular image that has almost nothing to do with reality.

1. All dinosaurs were covered with gray-green scales

At first, dinosaurs were thought to have a lot in common with reptiles. The very word "dinosaur", coined by Sir Richard Owen: The man who invented the dinosaur in 1842 by naturalist Richard Owen, comes from the Greek "formidable lizard."

But in fact, dinosaurs are relatives and ancestors of birds.

Thanks to the latest research, it was possible to establish that a huge number of dinosaur species had feathers. Including the formidable tyrannosaurs - however, their feathers were located in small numbers and only on the back.

Of course, the fact that many dinosaurs had feathers does not mean that literally everything was covered with them. There are now mammals without fur. Nevertheless, there is evidence that in their infancy, feathers were even, for example, in stegosaurs and triceratops - in the form of small bristles.

As for the coloring of dinosaurs, it is more difficult to judge here. However, there are ways to reconstruct the colors of ancient dinosaurs by defining the shape of melanosomes, pigment-accumulating organelles that can sometimes be seen in fossils. Thanks to them, they managed to find out that the small dinosaur anchiornis had a comb of red feathers, and one of the armored ankylosaurs had a rusty-red skin on top and light on the bottom.

2. Dilophosaurus were small, wore combs and spit venom

Remember this little creature from Jurassic Park? It's Dilophosaurus, and it kills park programmer Dennis Nedry. To begin with, he scares the hero with his swelling hood, spitting on his eyes with poisonous saliva, and then finishes him off.

A real Dilophosaurus, of course, would not behave like that. First, it did not have a hood like the modern frilled lizard, although it did have a pair of bone ridges on its head. Secondly, it almost certainly could not produce poison like other dinosaurs. And even more so to spit on them, like some of today's cobras.

However, he does not really need poison, because the real Dilophosaurus was about 3 m tall, in length from the muzzle to the tip of the tail, it was about 6 m and weighed about 400 kg. Such a creature will tear apart whoever it wants and without any poison.

3. Large dinosaurs had two brains

When scientists first dug up a stegosaurus (a humpbacked herbivorous lizard with two rows of plates on its back and spines on its tail), they assumed that it had two brains: one in the head, the second in the hip region of the spine, 20 times larger than the main one. In theory, he controlled the reflexes of the back of the body and allegedly turned on when the stegosaurus had to fight with predators with its tail.

Because of this, people with a bit of an interest in dinosaurs joked that the stegosaurus "thought with its ass" in battle.

However, this is a very old theory that has long been abandoned in the scientific community. What was initially thought to be a second brain actually turned out to be an organ called the glycogen body. Modern birds have this thing, and it contains a supply of nutrients for the nervous system. Not only the stegosaurus did not have a second brain, but also other large dinosaurs.

The fact that birds got their glycogen body from dinosaurs is further strong evidence that birds evolved from them.

4. Tyrannosaurus was a scavenger

This statement is found in many "compilations of amazing facts": the greatest predator on planet Earth actually fed on carrion! This is how deceiving looks are.

The theory that T-Rex was exclusively a scavenger was put forward by paleontologist Jack Horner in 1993. He referred to the fact that the lizard had too short and frail forelimbs, useless during the hunt, well-developed olfactory bulbs, allowing you to smell carrion from a distance, and teeth that perfectly crush bones.

In this, the tyrannosaurus resembled a vulture: he could easily sniff out carrion and eat meat, even if there was not much of it left on the bones.

However, this theory fell out of use. The binocular stereoscopic vision of a tyrannosaur, according to the latest data, allowed them to see no worse than modern hawks. And he also had a good ear, which made it possible to detect the steps of prey from afar.

On the bones of many hadrosaurs and ceratopsians, marks made by the teeth of tyrannosaurs were found - traces of terrible wounds. On the remains of tyrannosaurs, there were also traces left from the struggle with their victims: the prey did not surrender without a fight.

So now scientists are pretty sure that the tyrannosaurus was the dominant predator of its time. However, this did not prevent him from sometimes eating carrion. And sometimes tyrannosaurs generally practiced cannibalism. It is not a fact that they killed their own kind, but the corpses of their fallen relatives were eaten.

5. It was impossible to escape from the tyrannosaurus

In the films of the Jurassic Park series, a tyrannosaur can develop such a speed that cheetahs and ostriches can only envy. Sometimes a monster is able to chase people fleeing in a car and keep up.

In fact, Tyrannosaurus was hardly a perfect runner. His skeletal structure shows that he had powerful leg muscles. But while there are many large theropod footprints that have survived, none of them resemble those that would indicate running.

Modern calculations show that tyrannosaurs are unlikely to develop a speed of more than 18 km / h. They didn't need to run away from someone, so running would be too energy-consuming and not a particularly useful way to move.

But these dinosaurs walked fast and were extremely hardy. They pursued the victim with a brisk pace, demonstrating a fair amount of maneuverability: the tyrannosaurus could even quickly turn around on one leg! Most likely, the predator drove its prey until it was exhausted, and attacked it when the prey was tired.

So, if you meet a tyrannosaur, you can escape from it. Unless, of course, you're in high heels like Claire in Jurassic World.

6. Velociraptors were big, naked and very dangerous

Remember these predators? These are velociraptors, or simply raptors. Slightly shorter than a human, very agile, with sickle claws and very, very intelligent. In the Jurassic Park films, these dinosaurs hunted in packs, opened locks, and even succumbed to training.

Now you can forget this spectacular image, because the real Velociraptor was 1.5 m long, up to 70 cm high and weighed about 20 kg. Doesn't sound like a dominant killing machine, does it?

The image is also spoiled by the fact that the Velociraptors were covered in feathers. Such a big aggressive chicken.

A creature more like the Raptors from the Jurassic Park movie series was called Deinonychus. It reached 3, 3 m in length and weighed from 73 to 100 kg. Deinonychus also had feathers.

It is fair to say that in the novel Crichton mentions that his raptors are Deinonychus. They are related and belong to the Velociraptorin subfamily. In the films, there is no such reservation, therefore, in popular culture, all raptors are considered large creatures the size of a person.

7. Spinosaurus could defeat Tyrannosaurus

In the third "Jurassic Park", a tyrannosaurus engages in a fight with a spinosaurus - a huge predator with dexterous forepaws, a crest on the back and an elongated muzzle. Spinosaurus shows T-Rex that his front stumps are not good for anything: he grabs the head of the enemy with his paws and breaks his neck.

But in reality, such a battle was impossible. Tyrannosaurus lived in the Late Cretaceous period in North America (about 65 million years ago), while Spinosaurus lived in Middle Cretaceous Africa (about 100 million years ago). They would never have met.

You say: on an island with artificially cloned dinosaurs, such a skirmish can happen. Of course, but it still wouldn't have ended the way it did in the movie. Spinosaurus is well studied, and it is known for sure that its teeth were absolutely unsuitable for combat and hunting. He ate fish, swallowing prey whole, and was unable to bite off pieces of meat. Spinozar knew how to swim and spent a lot of time in the water.

So in reality, the T-Rex would simply rip the aquatic theropod apart, even though it was more authentic.

8. Tyrannosaurus rex's feet were useless

By the way, one more thing about the front legs of a Tyrannosaurus. Have you seen these short limbs? How can they be of any use?

Yes, it is quite. Tyrannosaurus rex could easily hold resisting victims with its front paws, hold the female during copulation and even help itself to rise from a lying position after sleep.

One paw of a Tyrannosaurus rex had two fingers, was 1 m long and could easily lift a load of 200 kg. Not bad for a creature that has never been to the gym.

9. Pterosaurs, Pleosaurs and Mosasaurs are Dinosaurs

Pterosaur. Illustration: Dmitry Bogdanov / Wikipedia Commons

Dimetrodon. Illustration: Dmitry Bogdanov / Wikipedia Commons

Plesiosaur. Illustration: Adam Stuart Smith / Wikipedia Commons

Pliosaurus. Illustration: Dmitry Bogdanov / Wikipedia Commons

Mosasaurus. Illustration: Dmitry Bogdanov / Wikipedia Commons

Take a look at this flying creature. This is a pterosaur. The next one is a dimetrodon with a huge ridge on its back. But the plesiosaurus is supposedly the ancestor of the famous Loch Ness monster. Ichthyosaurus looks like a fish, but it is a lizard. And finally, the Mosasaurus is a large 17-meter water monster with monstrous teeth.

Do you think these are all dinosaurs? No matter how it is.

Not everything with the ending "-saurus" is a dinosaur. It's just that these scientists love incomprehensible names.

Pterosaurs are not a species, but a whole detachment of flying dinosaurs, including pterodactyls, pteranodons, quetzalcoatls, hacegopteryx and other winged creatures. They were the first vertebrates to learn to fly. However, they are not dinosaurs: they are different groups.

Dimetrodon, with its recognizable crest, was not a reptile at all. He belonged to synapsids, beast-lizards, and was closer to mammals than reptiles. He lived long before the heyday of dinosaurs - 298, 9-268, 8 million years ago, in the Permian period.

Plesiosaurus, Pliosaurus and Mosasaurus were not dinosaurs either. The latter was in some way reminiscent of a modern monitor lizard, only large and able to swim.

10. Dinosaurs instantly became extinct after the fall of the meteorite

We are used to thinking that the impact of a meteorite is something like the explosion of an atomic bomb. One "boom", and the poor dinosaurs all fell upside down.

But this is not the case. It took almost 200,000 years for the habitual lizard-like dinosaurs to become extinct after the fall of Chikshulub. Due to the dust cloud raised by the meteorite, the climate changed, there was less plant food, and the large herbivorous dinosaurs gradually became extinct. And with them the predators.

For the company with dinosaurs, marine sauropsids, flying pterosaurs, many species of mollusks and small algae died. In total, 16% of families of marine animals and 18% of families of land vertebrates have disappeared.

11. Dinosaurs disappeared completely

This is not true. When scientists talk about the extinction of dinosaurs, they specify that they were "non-avian dinosaurs." Because birds evolved from dinosaurs about 150 million years ago and are their closest descendants.

So dinosaurs live quite well now, just in a feathered and flying form.

By the way, crocodiles and dinosaurs are not relatives at all. Crocodylomorphs The First Metriorhynchid Crocodylomorph from the Middle Jurassic of Spain, with Implications for Evolution of the Subclade Rhacheosaurini, the ancestors of these reptiles, lived before the heyday of dinosaurs in the Triassic period and hunted them.

So if you want to imagine how dinosaurs looked, behaved and moved, do not look at crocodiles. Look better at the ostriches. Or at least chickens.

12. We'll clone dinosaurs someday

In Jurassic Park, dinosaurs were cloned by extracting their DNA from blood-sucking insects frozen in amber. Unfortunately (or fortunately), however, such a trick is impossible in reality.

Dinosaur blood was indeed found in insects trapped in amber tar. But DNA is a very fragile thing that decays quickly, and it will not work to compose a complete genome from fragmentary fragments. The oldest DNA found now is 1.4 million years old, and it belonged to algae. Dinosaurs lived 65 million years ago. So we won't be able to clone them.