Please welcome Rukwatitan (over on Mark Witton’s blog)
September 9, 2014
I just read Mark Witton’s piece on the new new titanosaur Rukwatitan (as opposed to the old new titanosaur Dreadnoughtus). I was going to write something about it, but I realised that Mark has already said everything I would have, but better. So get yourselves over to his piece and enjoy the titanosaurianness of it all!
Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week 
September 9, 2014 at 4:05 pm
This is beautiful…I’ve always thought the guys who get to draw ‘artist’s interpretations’ of dinosaurs have the best jobs ever.
Have you ever tried a google image search of Dunkleosteus? Part of the reason it’s my favorite leviathan is that while its front was heavily armored, its rear half was not – so we have never found the back half fossilized…the ‘interpretations’ of what the back end might look like are pretty wacky!
September 9, 2014 at 4:49 pm
definitely awesome.
Someone needs to name a giant sauropod Petrothrafstira and a little one Petrokonikos. Poseidon was cool. Try something new. ;)
September 10, 2014 at 3:31 am
When I was a boy I was briefly fascinated by battleships. I noted each could blast anything in a thirty mile circle. (47 miles for Iowa, 52 miles for Yamato) Positioned thirty or so miles apart, 100 could cover the route from New York to London. It occurred to me there is only so much room on Earth for wild battleships to roam.
A dreadnought dinosaur must eat a fantastic amount to keep that bulk filled out. A herd would eat that much more. This would seem to compel a migratory lifestyle. The bigger the herd, the faster it would have to move to avoid starvation. And woe betide the herd that meets another. Both herds might starve.
Silly question time. Has there been an estimate of how many of these big guys the planet could have supported? Has there been an estimate of the typical size of a herd of these guys? Has it been established they were indeed herd animals, as distinct from a smaller group? Or single individuals?
Has there been an estimate of how long one of these beasts might live? And what of the volume and timbre of a titanosaur belch?
“Brief thoughts on dreadnoughtus” seems to indicate no, to all of the above. But I thought I’d ask directly.
September 10, 2014 at 6:15 am
Spelling, Mike! The Royal Navy wasn’t afraid of misbehaviour, it was afraid of NOTHING. DreadnOught, not DreadnAught. (Re: second line of your post.)
September 10, 2014 at 9:49 am
Thanks, Allen, good spot. Now fixed.
September 10, 2014 at 4:47 pm
I myself wish someone would name a giant sauropod “Eccebehemoth glorianus” (Here comes the Behemoth in Glory)
But that’s just me.
Also, I may have gotten the latin declension wrong there. It’s been too long.