The other day I had the opportunity to visit the historic Cutties Hillock, York Tower & Clashach quarries in Elgin, #Scotland, that yielded the famed 'Elgin Reptiles'. The former are a bit overgrown these days, but some blocks of tracks are still there at Clashach! #FossilFriday
Venkatasuchus was described by Haldar, Ray, & Bandyopadhyay (2023), which unfortunately isn't open access:
https://t.co/MW5lKV5Wip
However, you can read about it on its already extensive wikipedia page, courtesy of @ArminReindl:
https://t.co/9V92LgE5BE
3rd stem-#Croctober ink sketch, the new Indian aetosaur Venkatasuchus armatum, described just the other day by Haldar et al. Known only from some of its osteoderms, you could call this an "honest" reconstruction of this taxon.
2nd day of 2023 stem-#Croctober ink sketches is Shuvosaurus, which had its skull redescribed this year by Lehane in the context that it was a poposaur. Last time its skull was described in detail, it was still thought to have been a theropod dinosaur!
Taborda et al. (2023) included a 3D model of the skull, which was a fun reference to play with and to get an interesting angle to draw from. Their paper is open access and can be read here: https://t.co/mCrDtbn1Kl
Another year, another crack at (stem-) #Croctober ink sketches, this time based on research and & discoveries from 2023. 1st day is a fishing Riojasuchus, an ornithosuchid, as suggested by Taborda et al. (2023) based on their biomechanical analysis of its skull.
...Combined with a wedge-shaped skull, they suggest Riojasuchus hunted aquatic prey by plunging its snout underwater and trapping them in its jaws. I've speculatively reconstructed its nostrils facing backwards like some monitor lizards to prevent water going up them.
Today was a good day because I finally got #paleostream to draw Ufudocyclops for Flocking and quadruple its life restorations or so, great success!
Also we drew some other stuff too, I guess.
Sailing spiders from the time of early understandings, crossing a strait in Planet green and coming into contact with curious stomatopods.
from @aptshadow 's #ChildrenofTime series
#illustration#scifi#fanart
Seeing people discovering the ludicrous depths elephant seals can dive to for the first time has reminded me of my favourite stills taken of a southern elephant seal at depth (1273m specifically).
(๐ทtaken from van den Hoff et al. 2017 https://t.co/xIwjhrjsU0)
Dug up some palaeoart for #FossilFriday from the depths of my hard drive, a Herrerasaurus I drew ages ago but never got around to posting anywhere, released into the world at last.