Those mysterious extinct animals no one talks about

Adam Khor

Hey, I don´t know if u have a thread like this already, but I thought it would be interesting. You know how there are always rumors about certain fossil animals being found somewhere, and it sounds like very exciting news but no one talks about them and you can´t find info on them online?


For example, they say they found a HUGE fossil parrot in Easter Island, but I haven´t found anything at all about it! WBU?

Rubecula

Thats a new one on me. Never heard about a giant parrot from Easter Island. I would be happy to talk about it if it let me get a word in.:pac:

gbee

That parrot is probably not a parrot at all. A discovery is made and announced to the science world. After investigation they may deuce that there is insufficient data to corroborate, they suspect a hoax, it's a happen-stance of land fill, it's misidentified, it's identified by someone else or as something else.

It's then just quietly dropped for a while. Cases get re-looked as science progresses and a new assumption may emerge either totally changing the initial finding or collaborating them after years and years of dormancy.

Adam Khor

gbee wrote: »

That parrot is probably not a parrot at all. A discovery is made and announced to the science world. After investigation they may deuce that there is insufficient data to corroborate, they suspect a hoax, it's a happen-stance of land fill, it's misidentified, it's identified by someone else or as something else.

It's then just quietly dropped for a while. Cases get re-looked as science progresses and a new assumption may emerge either totally changing the initial finding or collaborating them after years and years of dormancy.

Oh well, that sucks, cuz 1) a giant parrot would be awesome and 2) we may die tomorrow and never find out!

There are also those Utahraptor remains that suggest a much larger size than expected. Back when I wrote to Jim Kirkland, he first told me that the whole thing was "a rumor" (which of course doesn´t mean it isn´t truth), then some time later he admitted that there was new material and that it would change our view of Utahraptor, and then he said those things about its skull looking very different than we always thought AND its being more of a juggernaut than a speedster, powerful enough to knock a house down (that's what he said, anyways...).
He also said that everything would be revealed in October, but I suspect he meant to paleontologists; I don´t know when we mere mortals will be told.

Also, they say there are new remains of Deinocheirus (!!) and rumor has it that it was indeed an ornithomimosaur, but unlike anything we have seen before. (We kinda knew that but still, what did the thing look like??). Anyone knows anything about this?

And I could go on and on. There's a rumor about raptors found in Brazil that would have coexisted with Oxalaia, as well as the fact that the famed Aramberri Monster wasn´t a pliosaur after all, there's the Mycocephale Paul Sereno introduced in a documentary (a cat-sized pachycephalosaur, either a re-naming of Microcephale or a new genus), a fossil nest supossedly belonging to Tyrannosaurus or other tyrannosaur...
It's really frustrating to know that all these things exist, but to have no further info on it.

tricky D

Adam Khor wrote: »

For example, they say they found a HUGE fossil parrot in Easter Island, but I haven´t found anything at all about it! WBU?

Easter Island is made of igneous rock so a fossil of a giant parrot is unlikely.

Adam Khor

tricky D wrote: »

Easter Island is made of igneous rock so a fossil of a giant parrot is unlikely.

That's what I thought too, but researching a little I found that fossils of several bird species have indeed been found...

Yitzhak Rabin

I'd say a lot has to do with the media atrocious inaccurate reporting of science related stories. Paleontologists probably don't like to release a story until it has been fully verified in case they have their names attached to sensationalist inaccurate reports.

Adam Khor

yekahS wrote: »

I'd say a lot has to do with the media atrocious inaccurate reporting of science related stories. Paleontologists probably don't like to release a story until it has been fully verified in case they have their names attached to sensationalist inaccurate reports.

But do they really need so much time to do that? >.<

Galvasean

Will we ever know about Das Monster von Minden?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Das_Monster_von_Minden

Alvin T. Grey

Its simple really, there are only so many column inches, and most of those are taken up by T-Rex ancestors.

I'm sure that T-Rex feels like a lotto winner. Suddenly he's got millions of relatives.....

Adam Khor

Alvin T. Grey wrote: »

I'm sure that T-Rex feels like a lotto winner. Suddenly he's got millions of relatives.....

XDD :pac:

You're probably right...

Alvin T. Grey

I never heard of Baryonyx until all the "Look-at-me-I'm-so-cool-I-can-kill-a-T-Rex" Spino hype.

(Hate that dinosaur.)

However I like Baryonyx. Bary is cool.

seamus

Galvasean wrote: »

Will we ever know about Das Monster von Minden?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Das_Monster_von_Minden

I wonder is there much of this in Palaeontology? Perhaps where someone carrying out a small or indepedently-funded dig, gets so far with it and then runs out of money, or finds themselves offered cash by a private collector, or otherwise fails to properly catalogue and report on their findings?

Galvasean

seamus wrote: »

I wonder is there much of this in Palaeontology? Perhaps where someone carrying out a small or indepedently-funded dig, gets so far with it and then runs out of money, or finds themselves offered cash by a private collector, or otherwise fails to properly catalogue and report on their findings?

Seems to happen an awful lot. In other cases like the famous Sue situation, palaeontologists were allowed dig to their hearts' content... until they found something valuable (ie: a T. rex). Suddenly everybody was in on the action and claiming ownership :rolleyes:

Adam Khor

Here's another one. They say they found an ankylosaur in Africa... anyone knows more about this?

Alvin T. Grey

Adam Khor wrote: »

Here's another one. They say they found an ankylosaur in Africa... anyone knows more about this?

The guys who found it?:D

Adam Khor

Alvin T. Grey wrote: »

The guys who found it?:D

Ha ha.