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Vintage Dinosaur Art: Dinosaurs - A Picture Dictionary 

Today's featured book is 1990's Dinosaurs: A Picture Dictionary. Featuring evocative artwork by Tessa Hamilton, it features a welcome variety of animals due to its alphabetical imperative - an organizing theme which also forgives some temporally and geographically questionable pairings of animals. It also just so happens to be the book I chose for Mike Keesey as his prize for his second place showing in the LITC All Yesterdays contest. It begins with a brief introduction to dinosaurs, set [...]

Totemism in different tribes in Jharkhand State of India. 

Sacredness of the totems is unique only with the indigenous people of Jharkhand.Totem also protects the equilibrium of the biodiversity.ByDr. Nitish PriyadarshiDespite knowing about biodiversity’s importance for a long time, human activity has been causing massive extinctions. Some 10-30% of the mammal, bird and amphibian species are threatened with extinction, due to human actions. We have to save them. Tribes of Jharkhand state of India are doing this with the help of totemism. A totem is a [...]

X-treme astronomy: Go behind-the-scenes of The X-Planets on April 18 

In this day and age, it seems like everyone is trying to add some excitement to their lives. Now that we no longer have animals trying to hunt us and have enough infrastructure that one bad harvest won’t wipe us … Continue reading

New giant tarantula found in Sri Lanka – Video 

According to the Sri Lanka Sunday Times, a new species of tarantula has been discovered there. This tree-dwelling spider has a leg diameter of about eight inches. “The spider is a smaller member of the Bird-Eating Tarantula sub-species found in South America that can kill animals as large as lizards, mice, birds and small snakes.

A spotlight on Echinoderm Art 

Things got a bit busy this week  and I've been discovering the wonders of the natural history side of DeviantArt! MANY creative and wonderful artists out there and I thought it would be cool to showcase some of the notable ones, especially the ones that can be compared against the "originals" Frankly, I'm pretty impressed. At one time, a LOT of these animals were known only to a handful

I've made a perfect Yesterday's piece according to some... 

Well I've hit a lot of flak, for my position on SVPoW that this otherwise beautiful picture by  Brian Engh (click for his website). I love this piece... but it is too much of a stretch for me to be humoured as scientific restoration.I want it made clear I'm not attacking Brian or this piece. Again I think it is a fantastic piece of art, and please go check out the rest of his portfolio. This post is in response to the comments I've received from the scientists and others on [...]

Crocodilians Dispersed Differently Than Mammals in the Americas 

The uplift of the Isthmus of Panama 2.6 million years ago formed a land-bridge that has long thought to be the crucial step in the interchange of animals between the Americas, including armadillos and giant sloths moving up into North America and relatives of modern horses, rabbits, foxes, pigs, cats, dogs, and elephants down into South America. However, in the March 2013 issue of the

Dinosaurs 

Dinosaurs are a diverse group of animals of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, approximately 230 million years ago, and were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for 135 million years, from the beginning of the Jurassic until the end of the Cretaceous, when the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event led to the extinction of most dinosaur groups at the close of the Mesozoic Era. The fossil record indicates that birds evolved from theropod dinosaurs during the [...]

Animal Wise by Virginia Morell 

In this entertaining and informative book, Virginia Morell explores cognition of thought and emotions in animals. She sets the stage in the first paragraph of the introduction where she asserts: “Animals have minds. They have brains, and use them, as we do: for experiencing the world, for thinking and feeling, and for solving the problems

Rub elbows with the Royal Family at a distinguished lecture from Royal Curator Caroline De Guitaut 

Caroline De Guitaut, curator at The Royal Collection Trust in London, is the author of three books on the work of Peter Carl Fabergé — Fabergé’s Animals: A Royal Farm in Miniature, Royal Fabergé, and Diamonds: A Jubilee Celebration. Basically, she’s … Continue reading

Oldest Biomarkers Recovered to Date from Carboniferous Crinoids 

Though scientists have long believed that complex organic molecules couldn't survive fossilization, some 350-million-year-old remains of aquatic sea creatures uncovered in Ohio, Indiana, and Iowa have challenged that assumption. The spindly animals with feathery arms—called crinoids, but better known today by the plant-like name "sea lily"—appear to have been buried alive in storms

Vintage Dinosaur Art: De Oerwereld van de Dinosauriërs - Part 3 

We haven't finished with De Oerwereld yet - not while I can still harvest more posts from it. Before proceeding, be sure that you've already ogled Part 1: Theropods and Part 2: Sauropodomorph Boogaloo. This week it's the turn of assorted ornisthichians, starting with a stunning work of art that was turned into one of the best-loved palaeo-posters since before time began (I'm in an '80s sort of mood, you see).Mark Hallett might just be my favourite palaeoartist, if not of all time, then [...]

Basal Placental Mammal Reconstructed from New Uber Phylogeny 

An international team of researchers has reconstructed the common ancestor of placental mammals—an extremely diverse group including animals ranging from rodents to whales to humans—using the world's largest dataset of both genetic and physical traits. In research to be published in the journal Science, the scientists reveal that, contradictory to a commonly held theory, placental mammals

Published This Day: Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication by Darwin 

From Today In Science History: In 1868, Charles Darwin's book - Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication - was published. He was 58. It is probably the second in importance of all his works. This was a follow-up work, written in response to criticisms that his theory of evolution was unsubstantiated. Darwin here supports his views via analysis of various aspects of plant and

Vintage Dinosaur Art: Dinosaurs: Giants of the Earth (a Pop-Up Book) 

An obscure 1980s children's book - it feels like it's been a while. Dinosaurs: Giants of the Earth was published in 1988, and is illustrated by Richard Courtney, with paper engineering by Keith Moseley. The author is unknown, but it's interesting to note that Paul Sereno apparently 'cooperated' in the making of this charming, chunky little book. Of course, I always love a pop-up.This is definitely one of those books for which the illustrator threw together some stuff based on his general [...]

Ediacaran/Cambrian Boundary Trace Fossils of Animals (Treptichnus pedum) Found in Namibiaa 

DEEP-WATER INCISED VALLEY DEPOSITS AT THE EDIACARAN-CAMBRIAN BOUNDARY IN SOUTHERN NAMIBIA CONTAIN ABUNDANT TREPTICHNUS PEDUM Authors: 1. JONATHAN P. WILSON (a,*) 2. JOHN P. GROTZINGER (a) 3. WOODWARD W. FISCHER (a) 4. KEVIN P. HAND (b) 5. SÖREN JENSEN (c) 6. ANDREW H. KNOLL (d) 7. JOHN ABELSON (e) 8. JOANNAH M. METZ (a) 9. NICOLA MCLOUGHLIN (f) 10. PHOEBE A. COHEN (g) 11. MICHAEL

Vintage Dinosaur Art: An Odyssey In Time: The Dinosaurs of North America 

Taking a break from De Oerwereld, we return this week to an artist who's probably been a little under-appreciated. Eleanor 'Ely' Kish produced her most important work in the 1970s and early 1980s, and a great deal of it is gathered together in Dale Russell's hefty An Odyssey In Time: The Dinosaurs of North America. It's a beautiful book, and one that is truly brought to life (as Russell acknowledges) by Kish's stunning paintings, even if time has not been kind to the way that many of the [...]

Dakoticancer Crab Fossils 

This fossil appears to be a Dakoticancer crab fossil found in the Coon Creek Formation of Mississippi or Tennessee, USA. The animals lived in the Cretaceous Period along with mosasaurs and plesiosaurs. Thanks to Mary Ann for finding these fossils and to Kenny who is prepping the fossils. There are 3 different specimens shown in the following

Life Traces of the Georgia Coast: Revealing the Unseen Lives of Plants and Animals 

Un libro que parece interesante y una pequeña reseña en inglés. Se puede conseguir en Amazon por 40 dólaresAnthony J. Martin, 2013, _Life Traces of the Georgia Coast: Revealing the Unseen Lives of Plants and Animals_, Indiana University Press, 670 pp.This is an aktuopaleoecological study of the terrestrial, freshwater, and marine track and tracemakers of the Georgia Sea Islands.  It describes and illustrates the traces (and tracemakers) in all of these environments, and does a kind of [...]

Comb Jellies Are More Basal Than Sponges? 

Animals evolved gradually, from the lowly sponge to the menagerie of tentacled, winged and brainy creatures that inhabit Earth today. This idea makes such intuitive sense that biologists are now stunned by genome-sequencing data suggesting that the sponges were preceded by complex marine predators called comb jellies. Although they are gelatinous like jellyfish, comb jellies form their