#ontogeny

[alphynix]

'Peculiar' crocodile ancestor started life on four legs before learning to walk on two

A "peculiar" ancient relative of the crocodile which experts believe began life on four legs before, in adulthood, it learned how to walk on

[do-doodles]

Sammy with orphan baby spinosaurus

[he-who-needs-to-be-silenced]

All of my lemuria challenge submissions so far

[a-dinosaur-a-day]

Years ago I talked to a science coat clad museum person who was going to a palentological talk in isle of wight.

I hadn't talked to someone who listened that closely and excitedly for years. Its a treasured memory. They even invited me to the talk, unfortunately I was going home next day as was only on holiday.

I was talking about how speciation is difficult to classify now, so I can only imagine dinosaurs.

I talked about gull and duck ring species and freaks of nature, hybridisation.

I knew for years of the nanotyrannus being juvenile trex thing.

I now know of the stygimoloc/dracorex being juvenile pachycephalosaur thing and the torosaur/triceratops debate.

I wondered if some dinosaurs that were found once could of been some of this (like beckalspinax, although they may actually be altispinax). But I understand majority is just due to rarity of fossilisation.

What do you think of all that? I'm not a paleontologist or a biologist (both have been a passion though).

There are probably a lot of species that are just ontogenetic stages of one another. But there are probably a lot that are legitimate! Luckily ontogeny we can determine with histological studies, if we're able to do them. And stuff like sexual dimorphism we can find by looking at populations and seeing there are two distinct peaks or morphs of differentiation. Since there are ways to determine of things are different sexes of the same species, or different growth stages, a lot of other variation is probably at least somewhat reflective of actual species and diversity. But, when it comes to fragmentary fossils, it gets a bit murkier.

[jareckiworld]

Isaac Abrams  —  Ontogeny   (oil on canvas, 2006)

[drawing-with-beasts]

Prehistoric mega-shark raised its young in nurseries: study

The largest sharks ever to have roamed the oceans parked their young in shallow, warm-water nurseries where food was abundant and predators scarce until they could assume their title as kings and queens of the sea.

[edgescience]

Alongside the horrific images of the fungi-infested cellar spiders which have made their way around the annals of Reddit, are the images of another natural phenomenon which barely anyone outside the realm of farm culture knows about. These disgustingly fish-like filaments of rubber and gel are a very common thing to see covering the feetsies of newborn critters. Let’s take a closer look as to what they are, why they exist, and how old they might be.

[arvalis]

You know if I'm spending all this time and energy to update the adult T. rex design for Saurian, I had to do the youngsters too. Their colors were inspired by baby komodo dragons and baby ratites, which have different coloration than their adults to help them camouflage. As I'm sure you've noticed, these guys are naked too. From the experts we've talked to working with Saurian, animals cannot completely change integument with age. But "baby cassowaries have feathers on their heads and lose them as they age!" I hear you say. Cassowaries always had skin under the feathers as babies, so they are really just losing feathers, not a radical change in integument. So like, they aint losing their feathers and growing scales. As such it was decided that the baby rexes should also be scaly if the adult is. Anyways look at how fast these turds look, its like a horse with a monitor lizard head.