Friday, October 21, 2005

Which spinosaur is that?

While searching for info to either confirm or deny that this "oldest South American Dromaeosaur" might actually be a spinosaurid, I came across the below images of a spinosaur skull in a japanese fossil catalogue. What puzzles me about it is that it is listed as a replica. I can't figure out what it is supposed to be a replica of. It isn't of Suchomimus as the website claims, since that is very different looking. Furthermore, the teeth in the sockets are either real spinosaur teeth, or some of the best replicas I've ever seen. Furthermore, if it is a replica, then somebody put alot more effort into painting it to look real than other specimens in the catalogue. I'm not suggesting that the whole thing is real. To the contrary, most of the lower jaw, the quadrates, the post orbital and possibly the squamosal look fabricated or at least of a very different preservational state than the rest of the skull. Irritator chalangeri has an orbit similar to this piece but ot the fancy rest (which does look real). Baryonyx and Suchomimus have much more rectangluar (rather than trianglular) profiles to their skulls and neither has the crest.


Oh, and since I'm on the topic, after reading the paper more carefully, I agree with the authors of the South American dromaeosaur paper. It was the maxilary fenestra that sold me on it.

1 comment:

California Will said...

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