The fossils and bones of these ancient animals tell us about the existence of dinosaurs. Scientists divide fossils into two types. The first type is the real remains of animals, such as teeth, parts of the skeleton. The second is various traces and prints on stones. For example, fossils of ancient fish are often found on stones as prints. And dinosaur fossils often belong to the first type. It can also be traces of teeth, legs or excrement.
Over the years, paleontologists have been able to discover many fossils, and even whole skeletons that literally remained mothballed in time. From some remains you can even see what the dinosaur did at its last moment in life. Others show a dinosaur image. Let's go back millions of years and look at the 10 most interesting dinosaur fossils according to most-beauty.ru.
1
Tyrannosaurus Rex chasing a sauropod
© 2014 Falkingham et al.
An archaeologist from the American Museum of Natural History Roland Bird in 1938 discovered a series of curious fossils with traces. It was found that these are traces of a tyrannosaurus and sauropod, which they left more than 111 million years ago. Two lines of tracks were connected with each other, which means that the tyrannosaurus chased the sauropod.
It is difficult to pinpoint the drama of those events. Maybe the predator ran after the sauropod. In a certain place, his track is interrupted. This suggests that the tyrannosaurus has bitten its prey. Other archaeologists believe that Rex tracked the sauropod in its wake. One thing is certain, the predator pursued the prey. These prints were found in American Texas.
2
Prey Hunter
© 2012 Frey, Tischlinger.
Many birds feed exclusively on fish. In the days of dinosaurs, the first bird was the pterosaur. It is more correct to say that it was a reptile that learned to fly. In the area of Zolnhofen, Germany, in 2009, ancient fossils of three animals of the dinosaur era were found: small fish, pterosaurus and aspidorchinchus. It was an extinct species of predatory fish. By their position, paleontologists understood the dramatic events of 155 million years ago.
The pterosaur was fishing on the surface of the water. With his beak he managed to catch a small fish, as at that moment an aspidorchinch grabbed him by the wing. A huge fish pulled a pterosaur under water. She tried to swallow it, but could not because of the large size of the latter. The pterosaurus stuck in the throat of the fish, and they all ended up at the bottom. Millions of years later, scientists were able to discover them and understand how everything happened.
By the way, there is a very interesting article about the most beautiful fish of our planet on most-beauty.ru.
3
Battle of two dinosaurs
Photo: © David Clark / Dinosaurs Alive / IMAX Film / Giant Screen Films.
The laws of nature are cruel, but fair. Animals kill each other for food and life. Dinosaurs did the same. The Gobi Desert in Mongolia is famous for having found many dinosaurs there. All of them are perfectly preserved due to the climate of the region. In 1971, archaeologists discovered the whole remains of two dinosaurs. One of them attacked the other, but did not finish his job. Scientists suggest that at that moment a sand dune fell on them, preserving the skeletons in a combat pose for 75 million years. Some scholars suggest that they could have killed each other in battle.
Velociraptor was a predator, and protoceratops defended itself. The latter was a herbivorous dinosaur. The remains of the battle are even visible. Velociraptor pierced with his foot and pressed on the neck of the protoceratops. Obviously, damaging the artery. The bleeding protoceratops tried to tilt the predator and bit him on the paw.
For some reason, they stayed in that position. Maybe they were covered in dune, maybe they were bleeding. It is possible that a heavy protoceratops simply strangled a lighter velociraptor with its weight. This will remain a mystery. The editors of most-beauty are waiting for your assumptions about this fight in the comments to this article.
4
Sleeping dinosaur
By Riley Black.
smithsonian.com
9.10.2012
Even despite the huge number of fossils found, we still don’t know much about dinosaurs. We can only speculate about their way of life, food, way of hunting. For example, we do not know how large dinosaurs and predators such as a tyrannosaurus slept. In what position? Almost all of the fossils belonged to already dead dinosaurs, or they were found at the time of death. This was evidenced by their body position.
But in 2004, in China, two archaeologists found the remains of a sleeping dinosaur. The dinosaur belonged to the species of troodontids. The skeleton was found curled up. He was called May Long or Sleeping Dragon. The estimated age of the find is about 140 million years. Thanks to this find, scientists have found that birds and dinosaurs descended from one ancestor. Also, dinosaurs were warm-blooded animals.
May Long died in a dream as a result of a volcanic eruption or carbon monoxide poisoning. It is poisoning that is considered the most accurate version. Other remains of similar animals were found nearby, but only one was asleep.
5
Parents
Scientists in 2003 managed to unearth a large group of fossils of 35 dinosaurs. The find age is 125 million years. The dinosaur species was called psittacosaurus. They are also called the "parrot lizard." These were small dinosaurs up to one meter tall, walked on two legs. A distinctive feature was the beak, which is similar in shape to the beak of a parrot. The psittacosaurs ate various fruits and laid eggs.
An interesting finding is that only one of the dinosaurs found was an adult, and the rest were small. This means that an adult looked after his offspring. All of them died instantly from the collapse or eruption of the volcano, since they were all in an upright position.
The find proved that such dinosaurs cared for their offspring. Even in modern reptiles, this is rare, but often found in birds. So dinosaurs are more akin to birds than to reptiles like crocodiles.
6
Lovers
The next interesting fossil was called "Romeo and Juliet." She was found in the Gobi Desert, Mongolia. These are the fossils of two bird-like dinosaurs that were together. Scientists suggest that they were female and male. They had mating games. The male looked after the female, but something happened that immediately killed them. Maybe this eruption, or a sand dune showered on them.
They belonged to oviraptors. These dinosaurs did not fly, but had feathers, tails and beaks. They walked in front of the females like peacocks and showed their beautiful tail. Sudden death interrupted love many millions of years ago.
7
Dinosaur Cub Snake Wanted To Eat
In the photo: Reconstruction of this event.
Image courtesy Ximena Erickson and Bonnie Miljour; sculpture by Tyler Keillor. Source.
Even huge dinosaurs had relatively small eggs. They were easy prey for adult creeping animals such as snakes. 67 million years ago, the genus of the snake Sanajeh indicus existed. Her fossils were discovered in 1984 in India. Paleontologists have determined that the snake was about to eat a dinosaur cub. The exact type of dinosaur could not be determined. Presumably this is a herbivorous sauropod or titanosaurus.
At first, scientists did not notice anything interesting about snake fossils. But then they all looked more closely. Scientists have discovered that a 3.5-meter snake crawled into a dinosaur’s nest and found three eggs there. It was at this moment that the cub began to hatch. The snake was about to eat the baby, when suddenly the nest was abruptly filled with dirt. Perhaps the cause of this was heavy rains. And the snake, and the cub, and the eggs remained untouched for millions of years.
8
Dinosaur that stuck in the mud
Photo above: artistic recreation.
Photo below: © Junchang Lu. Source: seeker.com.
We have already said that most dinosaurs were found at the time of death or after death. In Ganzhou, China, they found a unique fossil called the "mud dragon." It was an oviraptorosaurus. He was similar to birds, walked on two legs, had wings, feathers and a toothless beak, but did not fly. The dinosaur was stuck in the mud and tried to get out to the last. This is evidenced by his posture. He reached up, trying to escape, but failed.
For scientists, this fossil is very important, since it refers to the period of a likely meteorite fall on Earth and the death of dinosaurs. She can tell a lot about those events. Found a fossil by accident during construction work.
9
Scavenger
In China, in 2008, bones and teeth of two species of dinosaurs were found. The teeth belonged to a velociraptor or other dinosaur closely related to the genus. The bones belonged to protoceratops. This dinosaur is much larger than a velociraptor. But how could they kill him?
Velociraptors reached no more than 1.5 meters in height, herbivorous protoceratops are much larger. Probably the predator was eating a dead dinosaur. This also confirms the fact that teeth marks remained on the dinosaur's head. So, dinosaurs did not disdain to feast on carrion.
10
A dinosaur that was found exactly the way it looked millions of years ago
Fossils are rarely found whole and untouched by time. As a rule, these are fragments of bones, teeth or other parts of the skeleton. Rarely found surviving fabrics or feathers. What good luck befell scientists when they found an untouched dinosaur, whose age is 110 million years. It was a nodosaurus.
He was accidentally discovered while working in mines in Canada in 2011. These were quite large animals, weighing up to 1,400 kilograms. They ate grass and had thick armor, as well as sharp half-meter ledges on the sides. They were relatives of modern rhinos.
Scientists suggest that circumstances helped the dinosaur to survive. The dead carcass was washed away into the ocean, and there it fell into a whirlpool and was covered with a layer of dirt. Minerals on the skin reacted and preserved the body, which has been perfectly preserved to this day.
Finally
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