Ch-ch-ch-changes
April 28, 2010
This one’s mostly a housekeeping post, to keep you abreast of some notable developments with SV-POW!sketeers and friends.
- Added April 29 – I’m such a tool, forgot to mention that another awesomely niche-y blog has been unleashed on the paleo-blogosphere: March of the Fossil Penguins, by our friend and sometime sauropod-describer Dan Ksepka. Go waggle your hydrodynamic forelimbs at him, I’m sure he’ll be happy to regurgitate some tasty posts for you.
- I’m tired of paying for sauroposeidon.net so I’m letting it lapse at the end of this week. I’ve already migrated my CV and papers to a new site, where they will hopefully remain forever. As previously noted, The Marsh Repository also has a new home.
- Ask A Biologist is back! Go make yourselves useful/satisfy your curiosity. Don’t forget to thank your friendly local Dave Hone.
- Mike’s new blog, The Reinvigorated Programmer, is all of two months old and has already passed SV-POW! in total hits. So don’t give him any more link traffic. Instead, tell your friends how wonderful SV-POW! is!
- After two and a half years of weekly posts, we’ve decided to stop being so slavish about our titular obligation and will henceforth blog as frequently or infrequently as we please. We’re keeping the title, though. If you’re offended by that, you can backronym SV-POW! as Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Whenever.
- Similarly, we’re going to start posting about sauropod skulls and appendicular bits from time to time. Not that we haven’t been doing that anyway–heck, even wallaby toes are not safe from our roving curiosity–but we’re going to stop marking such posts off-topic and putting in obligatory sauropod vert photos.
Don’t worry, though, we’ll still be mostly sauropod vertebrae, most of the time. And speaking of, here’s something lovely: a cervical of Rapetosaurus, from Curry Rogers (2009:fig. 5). Cool fossae, eh? Also, check out how dinky the centrum is compared to the neural arch.
Reference
Curry Rogers, K. 2009. The postcranial osteology of Rapetosaurus krausei (Sauropoda: Titanosauria) from the Late Cretaceous of Madagascar. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 29(4):1046-1086.
Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week 
April 28, 2010 at 2:47 pm
“I’m tired of paying for sauroposeidon.net” Isn’t it like $6 a year to get a domain name these days?
April 29, 2010 at 8:18 pm
It ought to be. But try telling that to the $#@%*&’s I have to pay every year.
And anyway, 0 < 6. ;-)
April 30, 2010 at 3:21 am
Nice work, Demetrios!
May 14, 2010 at 2:25 am
I never would have thought so two years ago, but I’m missing my sauropod vertebra updates.
May 21, 2010 at 10:01 pm
OK, a question. Swans sleep with their heads placed above their abdominal air sacs, right? Did Sauropods? Isn’t it likely the death pose found in many articulated dinosaur skeletons would indicate a volcanic cloud or dust storm killed them while asleep, whether floating on water or on the ground, with their heads held between their shoulders, resting in a safe defensive posture? Arboreal birds and lizards don’t do that. This would seem to connect to pneumatic sauropod dorsal vertebrae a bit.
May 22, 2010 at 9:14 am
As far as I know, no-one’s even published anything on how sauropods slept, and frankly I find it hard to imagine how they did. Their necks would have lacked the flexibility to do what swans do — although we think Stevens and Parrish overstated their inflexibility, that much seems clear — and I hate to imagine a hundred-tonne titanosaur laying itself down to sleep and getting up again in the morning. So really I have no idea, and I doubt that anyone else has much, either.
May 23, 2010 at 5:24 am
Ok, thanks. I keep forgetting to check neck vertebral flexibility (made the same mistake with pterosaurs).
May 26, 2010 at 12:34 am
>>I never would have thought so two years ago, but I’m missing my sauropod vertebra updates.
Same here!
May 26, 2010 at 12:11 pm
[…] here is another cervical vertebra of Rapetosaurus, last featured in our previous article the best part of a month ago: Ninth cervical vertebra (FMNH PR 2209) of Rapetosaurus krausei in A, […]
September 26, 2011 at 12:24 am
[…] as a joke, and continued it during the actually-posting-weekly-about-sauropod-vertebrae phase (which lasted for 2.5 years) because it was fun and challenging, and maintain it now because it’s fun, we enjoy the wacky […]
March 21, 2013 at 7:56 am
[…] From Ch-ch-ch-changes, cervical 11 of Rapetosaurus, from Curry Rogers (2009:fig. 5). Notice how tiny the centrum is […]