Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week

If you’re thinking that it’s about time to look at some sauropod vertebrae from the Salt Wash member of the Morrison Formation, well, you’re gol-durned right, pardner. Let’s ride.

Here’s a vertebra sticking out of the rock. For once it’s not in cross-section. We’re simply looking at the posterior surface of a dorsal vertebra and bits of its associated ribs. Let’s stand it up correctly:

And, well, heck, Alex, I’d like to go ahead and solve the puzzle:

Figure on the right from Wedel and Taylor (2013a), and composed in turn from plates in Hatcher (1901, Diplodocus), Hatcher (1903, Haplocanthosaurus), and Gilmore (1936, Apatosaurus).

UPDATE: I had the discovery sequence wrong–this is one of the bones that was first found by photographer Guy Tal, who then put ReBecca Hunt-Foster onto the area. ReBecca has since gone on to become Monument Paleontologist at Dinosaur National Monument, but at the time she was working as a BLM paleontologist out of the Moab office. ReBecca then brought out some more of us out to take a look, and that was the genesis of my work with her and John in the Salt Wash.

John Foster and Cary Woodruff were both there when I saw this vertebra for the first time. I think we set a new record for a consensus among paleontologists in concluding that this vertebra belongs to Haplocanthosaurus. The super-tall, cathedral-esque laminae arching over the neural canal and the up-tilted transverse processes are absolutely diagnostic, and not present in any other Morrison sauropods. Haplocanthosaurus is one of the rarer sauropods in the Morrison, so it’s nice to have one in our Salt Wash fauna. Not least because of all the other awesome sauropods out there, it’s this weird little duck that my destiny seems to have become intertwingled with (exhibits A, B, C, D, E, and counting).

Speaking of: did you remember that the Western Science Center exhibit on the Snowmass Haplocanthosaurus is still up for a couple more months? Have you seen it? Go see it!

Life restoration of Haplocanthosaurus by Brian Engh, for the Western Science Center exhibit.

So, hey, rock and roll, we have Haplocanthosaurus, and that is legitimately exciting. Between that and Camarasaurus (covered here) we have the primitive-and-unspecialized end of the Morrison sauropods sewn up. Anything bigger or more exotic? Why, yes, in fact. Stay tuned.

This is another “Road to Jurassic Reimagined, Part 2″ post. You know the drill: Part 1 is here, Part 2 will be going up here in the near future, Part 3 will be along sometime after that.

References

• Gilmore Charles W. 1936. Osteology of Apatosaurus, with special reference to specimens in the Carnegie Museum. Memoirs of the Carnegie Museum 11:175–300 and plates XXI–XXXIV.
• Hatcher, John Bell. 1901. Diplodocus (Marsh): its osteology, taxonomy, and probable habits, with a restoration of the skeleton. Memoirs of the Carnegie Museum 1:1-63.
• Hatcher, J.B. 1903. Osteology of Haplocanthosaurus with description of a new species, and remarks on the probable habits of the Sauropoda and the age and origin of the Atlantosaurus beds; additional remarks on Diplodocus. Memoirs of the Carnegie Museum 2:1-75.
• Wedel, Mathew J., and Michael P. Taylor. 2013. Neural spine bifurcation in sauropod dinosaurs of the Morrison Formation: ontogenetic and phylogenetic implications. Palarch’s Journal of Vertebrate Palaeontology 10(1):1-34. ISSN 1567-2158.