They show that there were tyrannosauroids, spinosaurids and other theropod taxa in units like the Wadhurst Clay Formation that are currently >>wholly unrepresented<< by skeletal remains. We dream that good remains will one day allow us to identify and name the taxa present here...

Show Post

An exception to the 'don't name fragments' position is provided by Vectiraptor greeni Longrich et al., 2023 from the Wessex Formation, established for two vertebrae and a referred sacrum. I can buy the authors' view that the specimens can be identified to a group, namely Dromaeosauridae...

Show Post

They fit with the general pattern that has emerged from the Mesozoic fossil record: that dinosaur diversity was substantially higher than officially 'accepted', named taxa imply. There are just so many additional taxa yet to properly document and name....

Show Post

Back when way, way less was known about Mesozoic dinosaurs, essentially every new fragmentary fossil was unique and hence deemed worthy of a name, so a list of non-overlapping Victorian finds are holotypes: Aristosuchus is a sacrum with pelvic bones, Calamosaurus is neck vertebrae, and so on...

Show Post

This is due to an utterly different taphonomic history from that of, say, contemporaneous Lower Cretaceous strata of China (where volcanic events led to burial of complete skeletons). Wealden small dinosaurs, for the most part, got broken apart and scattered across a floodplain...

Show Post