#but it just looks like a dinosauroid

[thagomizersshow]

I love when sci-fi/fantasy writers throw in a random fact about a fictional species that actually has big repercussions for that species' biology.

Like, there is a species in Star Trek called Saurians who are adorable dinosauroid looking dudes. They've had very little revealed about them despite having been mentioned as early as the original series by way of "Saurian brandy" — a drink that is so strong it can put a Klingon on their ass in one swig.

Other than that, most of what we know about them comes from snippets involving a reoccuring character on Discovery named Linus, who is mostly a comic relief character. Now the reason I bring them up is that in one episode there's a scene where Linus is eating bamboo of all things, and I'm not sure the writers realized how telling this is about Saurian biology.

Bamboo is a damn hard food to eat, and us humans can only eat the shoots of a few species. Even then, raw consumption of shoots can lead to cyanide poisoning if you aren't careful. We still don't know how exactly a lot of animals that eat a lot of bamboo (bamboo lemurs, red pandas, bamboo rats, elephants, gorillas) are able to digest so much of it without getting cyanide poisoning. There is some sort of neutralization process in giant pandas involving the rhodanese enzyme that turns cyanide into the non-toxic thiocyanate that they just pee out, but the process is still poorly understood in other species.

Bamboo is also hard to digest for the same reason all grasses are; their plant wall cellulose is hard as hell to break down. Like, your choices are:

a) you do a poor job of digesting it and just spend all day eating (giant panda, red panda, bamboo lemur)

b) you grow really big and have a big gut (elephants, gorillas)

c) you only eat the parts of the plant that are easier to digest (bamboo rats)

On top of that, bamboo is loaded with silica phytoliths that are like microscopic bits of glass. These evolved to make their tissues even harder to chew and metabolize.

It's hard to make out in the scene, but it looks like Linus is eating raw bamboo leaves. Just picking them up with his fingers and munching on them like it's nothing. That means his teeth and/or jaws would need to be very powerful (maybe hypsodont? or maybe tooth batteries?) AND, because he's eating it raw, he'd have to be immune to the cyanide in some way.

One explanation could be in the Star Trek Adventures TTRPG, where Saurians are said to have an ability called "Enhanced Metabolism" where they recover from toxins faster than other species (my guess is this was meant to reference their brandy being so strong). BUT, that's not the same thing as the immunity real bamboo eating animals seem to have. My head canon is that Saurians have a diet similar to red pandas, where bamboo-like plants are their main diet on their homeworld, but they'll eat other stuff too when it's available, AND they've evolved some way to convert cyanide into a harmless chemical they excrete, like a giant panda.

All of these whacky biology shenanigans stem (hehe) from the casual writing decision to make a supporting alien character seem weird by eating a weird thing.

#star trek #star trek: discovery #sci-fi

[alphynix]

It Came From The Wastebasket #05: The Trouble With Troodon

Troodontids were small bird-like theropod dinosaurs, lightly built with slender legs and sickle-shaped "raptor" claws on the second toes of their feet. They had fairly big brains proportional to their body size, rather like modern birds, and their large forward-facing eyes had good depth perception. Owl-like asymmetrical ears in some species gave them a very keen sense of hearing, suggesting they may have been nocturnal hunters using sound to pinpoint the location of small prey.

The original specimen of the namesake of the group, Troodon formosus, was a serrated tooth discovered in the 1850s, about 77 million years old and originating from the Late Cretaceous Judith River Formation fossil beds in Montana, USA. It was so little to work with that it was initially mistaken for a lizard tooth, then during the 20th century it was recognized as belonging to a dinosaur and spent time classified as a megalosaurid, then a pachycephalosaur, then finally as a small theropod similar to the Mongolian Saurornithoides.

In the late 1980s it was merged together with multiple other troodontids (including Stenonychosaurus of speculative "dinosauroid" fame), and since Troodon had been the first of all of them to be named it took priority as the genus name.

And then for a while every single Late Cretaceous troodontid specimen from North America was also lumped into Troodon, turning it into a wastebasket taxon.

The problem was that all these troodontids came from locations separated by thousands of kilometers and millions of years of time, and it's unlikely that they all actually represented just one single species. But they were only known from rare fragmentary remains, making distinguishing them from each other difficult, and the original Troodon tooth didn't really have any distinctive features either – it turns out most troodontid teeth all look exactly the same!

It was becmoning increasingly dubious whether Troodon was even a valid name at all, and during the 2010s several paleontologists began trying to sort the mess out. The old names Pectinodon and Stenonychosaurus were revived, and some 'Troodon' fossils were also split off and given completely new names, becoming Albertavenator and Latenivenatrix*.

* Although Latenivenatrix might not actually be distinct enough from Stenonychosaurus to justify having a separate name.

As of 2022, Troodon itself is now in a sort of taxonomic limbo, with some paleontologists abandoning it as a dubious name while others are still arguing in favor of continuing to use it. The name could potentially be properly rescued if the original tooth can be clearly linked to better fossil material, letting Troodon take over priority again from one of the other better-established troodontids, or by defining a new type species similar to what happened with Iguanodon.

…But with how incredibly generic that tooth is, both of those options would be very difficult.

———

Nix Illustration | Tumblr | Twitter | Patreon

#it came from the wastebasket #wastebasket taxon #taxonomy #troodon #stenonychosaurus #pectinodon #albertavenator #latenivenatrix #troodontid #maniraptora #theropod #dinosaur #paleontology #art #science illustration #paleoart #palaeoblr

[dragonthunders01]

Spectember D27: Revamp the Dinosauroid

The end of the Triassic propitiated finally the dominance of dinosaurs in the next period with the rupture of the large supercontinent Pangea, though in this timeline something pushed further the fragmentation of the continent, and instead of just opening the rift of the Atlantic, it multiplied across Africa and a section of south America, making the Tr/J mass extinction more severe and killing out many more species of dinosaurs, so now the Jurassic was no longer dominated by the animals we have in our timeline, instead we get a strange variety of large dinosaur-like crocodiles, many sauropodomorphs that diverged from the smaller species that survived and never went into the same trend of gigantism as in our earth, many synapsids and so on. At the end of the late Jurassic a lot happened with the new order, within some of the second radiation of sauropodomorphs included varied carnivorous carnosaur-like species, medium size coelurosaur-like omnivores and smaller herbivores that look like silesaurs; from the omnivore lineage that have expanded in varied niches would rise a branch of semiaquatic species that resembled something like a scaly penguin with hands, long finger and claws, with short robust tails, shorter necks and longer heads with narrow keratinized mouths.

They are remarkable as many other animals of this world, through one particular species seems to have started a peculiar evolutionary trend in the last 10 million years.

For the reader, we will refer to this species as the Shagoids, a species originated from 50 cm long aquatic sauropodomorph descendants that wandered on the estuaries of the now more fragmented north Africa/south American region, their ancestors were more of a mix of a cormorant with an otter as unlike the rest of its own family this belongs, as one main feature of these are they still functional forelimbs, these still preserved functional arms and hands that helped them to manipulate their prey of crustaceans and mollusks. Over time these developed strategies to break down their prey shell, including the habit of picking and using stones which choose appropriately for this task. This behavior was passed on to new generations, learned and properly helped them to get food with less effort, the food quality increased brain energy, brain size also increased and so their skills were forged much more adequately.

It was on matter of few million years the Shagoids lineage abandoned their swimming lifestyle and became mostly semi aquatic coastal dwellers, living in the shores and just entering water to hunt their food rather than spending most of their time there. As social animals they formed hierarchy groups, formed by the head of a dominant female around minor males that could either mate with her or just serve them, as well many other younger individuals, matriarchs often had the duty to select and organize hunting and spending of food, as well regulate reproduction and mating between their lower family, as she normally is the eldest of the group, and only another female of the same blood can turn into a elder matriarch of if mated by the son of the elder, this perhaps was the moment they gained proper sentience as how they defined a cultural and social structure.

It seems at the end rathe in a sudden change of sea level in the last 3 million years did the final push on their evolutionary journey, as most of the Shagoid populations got stranded within the main continent with almost no way to find new connections to large water bodies, in other situation their species would have die for starvation, but at that point they were already adapted to feed on other food sources, from tubers, insects and small animals, being able to cook them using fire they managed to craft, and so properly passed the harsh time with the loss of a chunk of their population over the sudden change.

When the Shagoid expanded and found again large water bodies far from their native regions, they really have changed considerable from their ancestors, as their closest relative was a sort of strange loon like reptilian species wandering in the coasts, these were more like limbed penguins with long arms and tridactyl hands, which the third finger being a derivation of the 4th an 5th clawless digit fused into one, their short legs lost their webbed feet a while ago and are more adapted for walking, their head still preserve the characteristic seabird like shape but their teeth have changed in shape to be generalistic omnivore, with a large head which houses the most intelligent brain in the planet.

Over the last thousands of years, they have been becoming more and more prone to establish permanent settlements populated by hundreds of them much more different of their wandering tribes, often farm plants and even carry some animals for domestication.

For the first time in their history they are in the pathway of civilization… who knows what will happen next, either the Shagoid can remain like this until their extinction, or they will start building towards the sky and beyond.

#speculative evolution #alternative evolution #triassic #jurassic #sauropodomorph #dinosauroid #sapient #spectember

[doorbloggr]

There is no dinosaur named Troodon

Sunday 23/4/23

Alaskan Troodontid - Julio Lacerda @paleoart

A brief sorry for not writing for a while. Had a lot on my mind and also just struggled to get that jump-start on my creativity again. But after having a bit of nerd-out at a friend recently, I have a dinosaur related thing to talk about today.

For anyone knee-deep into dinosaur stuff, they'd know about the popular stereotyping around small meat eating dinosaurs. The likes of "Raptors" are often portrayed as problem solvers; coordinated, and clever. And although most modern birds have more developed brains than extinct non-bird dinosaurs, the exception of Troodon is often brought up.

Troodon - @/the_meep_lord on Twitter

Troodon is a name that dino-nerds will bring up as a notable example of smart dinosaurs. It was one of the dinosaurs most closely related to birds, it had large eyes for its head, and in fact the largest brain to body size ratio of any non-avian dinosaur. But what many dino-nerds might struggle with, is that most palaeontologists believe that the genus Troodon is not valid.

Now when I first heard this information, my reaction was likely the same to yours reader. What do mean the genus isn't valid? Ask anyone what Troodon looks like, we have a very clear picture. How can we have full skeletons of a dinosaur that didn't exist? How come we have a significant clade of dinosaurs named after it (Troodontidae)? It is a dinosaur that even had unfortunate older stereotypes in its design (pictured below: the olive green smooth skinned Troodon that inspired the ugly Dinosauroid speculative biology thing).

llustration of Troodon - De Agostini Library (unable to find artist)

The issue, as I'll try to explain, was an unfortunate game of guesswork and generalisation across the Palaeontological community.

Discovery and Naming

In 1855, a single fossil teeth was found in Montana, USA. This was a particularly jagged tooth, and seemed to belong to some form of carnivorous or at least omnivorous reptile. It was named Troodon formosus meaning "wounding tooth, well formed". This tooth was originally classified as belonging to a lizard, so the genus Troodon was born.

Troodon holotype drawing, 1860

In 1901, it was decided that Troodon's tooth belonged to a dinosaur, within the group Megalosauridae. But as I've discussed previously, Megalosaurus was a wastebasket taxon, and other experts wanted to place Troodon somewhere more definitive. In 1924, Troodon was classified as a relative of dome-headed dinosaurs such as Pachycephalosaurus and Stegoceras. And since Troodon pre-dated many dinosaurs in this group, the family was at the time referred to as Troodontidae.

"Sandy", Pachycephalosaurus specimen at Royal Ontario Museum

Troodon as a Pachycephalosaur lasted until 1945, when Troodon was finally reclassified as carnivorous dinosaur, and the dome-headed dinosaurs were renamed under the title Pachycephalosauridae.

Other Troodontids

For a long time, the issue with Troodon was that because it's teeth were one of a kind, they did not know how the rest of it's body looked. The first dinosaur to be classified under Troodontidae that wasn't named just for teeth was a dinosaur called Stenonychosaurus (meaning 'narrow claw lizard").

Stenonychosaurus, Nix Illustration @alphynix

The original specimen of Stenonychosaurus did not have teeth, but it's close relative Saurornithoides did. And once both specimens had more complete specimens collected, they were classified under the group Saurornithoididae in the 1980s. But soon, scientists found similarities between the teeth of Saurornithoididae dinosaurs, and that of Troodon. The Principle of Priority states that earlier names for taxon are more valid taxonomically, so Saurornithoididae was considered synonymous with Troodontidae, and all specimens previously referred to as Stenonychosaurus were now called Troodon.

"Troodon" Specimen, Perot Museum, Texas

Most of the facts we now think of as Troodon were originally attributed to Stenonychosaurus, and many other North American Troodontids were considered as possible synonyms of Troodon, but this received some push back.

The idea that most of North America's Troodontids all belonging to one taxa was questioned. So, as had happened to other wastebasket taxon prior, Troodon was reanalysed.

In the late 2000s, a Troodontid called Pectinodon was separated from the Troodon genus and considered its own taxon. In the mid-late 2010s, some material originally classified under Stenonychosaurus, and then Troodon, was given its own genus, Latenivenatrix.

Latenivenatrix sculpture, @bookrat

Was "Troodon" really Troodon?

So the question of "What is a Troodontid?" had a very clear answer now. They were small to medium Theropod dinosaurs with narrow skulls, front facing eyes, larger braincases, and often restored with sickleclaws and feathers, similar to the Dromeosaurs. But the question came back to the Genus Troodon itself. We had sufficient material of many other Troodontids to tell what most of their body looked like, but the "holotype" of Troodon was still just one tooth.

In case you need a refresher on the terminology, a holotype is the first fossil a new species is named for. For another fossil to be named the same species, it needs to be identified as similar enough to the holotype. Holotypes are often fragmentary, it is common practice to fill in the full skeleton with details from similar relatives, but you still need enough details to identify who your relatives are.

The holotype of Troodon was so fragmentary, (again one bone), that it has been referred to as undiagnostic. Terminology lesson again, that means you CANNOT tell what it belongs to.

The fragmentary Holotype of the more recent Troodontid "Talos sampsoni", was almost complete in comparison to Troodon's. Credit: Scott Hartman

The Troodon tooth was *similar* enough to Stenonychosaurus that they were proposed to be close relatives, but there were differences enough for there to be initial scepticism at their synonymy. The original explanation proposed that the Troodon tooth came from an individual who was older, or in a different part of the mouth to teeth found from Stenonychosaurus, but this was never scientifically scrutinised, just proposed. The whole absorbing of Stenonychosaurus into Troodon was based on heresy that had never been scientifically tested.

So in 2017, almost universally, it was decided that Stenonychosaurus be separated from Troodon as its own valid dinosaur. Almost all material that had at that point been assigned to Troodon were reassigned to Stenonychosaurus or Latenivenatrix. And now the genus Troodon had a problem. If all known fossil material came down to a single, very undiagnostic tooth, then what WAS this dinosaur actually like?

Stenonychosaurus - Anuperator (deviantart)

The current take is that there was no dinosaur known as Troodon in the technical sense. The tooth may not even belong to a Troodontid. But since Troodontidae has become an established group with established diagnostic traits, we still get to keep the name, for the group at least.

Troodontids Now

Troodontidae is still a very popular mainstream group of dinosaurs, but the names Stenonychosaurus, Saurornithoides, and Latenivenatrix are not as well known as Troodon. Many recent paleoart projects, particularly animations have depicted Troodon-like dinosaurs. But for scientific accuracy, they often decide to use the catch-all term "Troodontid", so audiences know what dinosaur we're talking about without being unscientific.

The YouTube Animation series "Dinosauria" features an episode on Arctic North American Dinosaurs. The main character is referred to as an Alaskan Troodon. This dinosaur has been originally proposed as a larger subspecies of Troodon described from larger teeth found in Alaska. As of writing, this Troodontid still does not an official description or scientific name.

In the 4th episode of the Apple TV+ series, Prehistoric Planet, we again see a dinosaur probably based on the Alaskan Troodon, this time just referred to as a "Troodontid".

In both pieces of media, the Troodontids engage in intelligent problem solving, but nothing on the level of what Jurassic Park would engage in. In Dinosauria, the Troodontid uses vocal mimicry. In Prehistoric Planet, it uses burning sticks to spread a wildfire. Both behaviours that different modern birds engage in, but may have been a stretch for what non-avian dinosaurs were capable of.

Thanks for Reading

If you are still a bit confused as to what this all meant, that's OK, it took me a while to get me head around it too. I encourage readers to do their own research and come to their own conclusion as to what this all means.

If you did feel my explanations helped you learn something new today, please reblog and spread the word. Of course add on your own commentary to the reblogs if you have insight that would better clarify the topic.

Thankyou for reading, and I'll hopefully have something else to post on here soon.

#blog #blogpost #palaeontology #dinosaurs #troodon #troodon formosus #stenonychosaurus #Latenivenatrix #Troodontidae #nomen dubium #theropod #Youtube #long post

[t34-mt]

What are some spec bio artists that inspire you? Or media containing speculative biology

WAYNE...wayne barlowe is the first that comes to mind for that specific genre, he's insanely good at making aliens that well, really does feel alien! My fav work from him is the darwin expedition (which id sell a kidney to have a copy of) and the work he did for avatar 1. If the spec bio of avatar 1 didn't look so good then I probably would've never started altuyur!

not saying that the aliens of the second movie are bad, I literally have the concept art book just for that. They're good too but there's just something about them I can't pinpoint why they're not as good as the ones made by wayne. sometimes I just wonder what he would've made if he was still here

obvious one, cause he's kind of the og guy about this is kosemen! especially for his world of dinosauroids he and Simon Roy did, def one of my fav spec evo projects out there id literally do anything to have it adapted in a prehistoric planet-style documentary. I also really like all tomorrows of course, if i had to pick a posthuman species to turn into i think id be a snake person or killer folk i just think they're cool.. Satyriacs are awesome too they just fuck around all-day

this gives me the opportunity to show people this colonial plush someone made, i think it looks miserable and is maybe suffering all day being sentient in a body like this but is cared after by the maker, i just like thing very much

ARUGHHHH for last alex ries for his birrin project in particular! and the work he did for subnautica which is just so fun and colorful, i love fish very much. the day ill get an actual computer rather than my laptop that overheats and turns off on a fucking roblox game then ill buy it and you wont hear from me for 3 months. back to birrins, i just think they're so cool, good shape, very cute very lively looking id love to meet one, i love their worldbuilding a lot! once the birrin book is out ill latch onto it cause its one of the things im waiting for the most

#speculative zoology #2023 #ask

[kaijuthespacemaniraptorian]

Tree Creeper from Primeval

This is a Reimagined take on the Tree Creeper trying to make it more unique, and i gave it a fun scientific name Simiaraptor Sylvaticus !

The Simiaraptor is an undiscovered maniraptorian dinosaur and its a new lineage of parave a unique group of paravian dinosaur that look similar to dromaeosaurs but evolved an aboreal life style similar to monkeys and even went as far as to convergently evolve an ape like apparence having longer arms for better reach in climbing and more flexible hands to climb well and also interacting with stuff, they even use their claws to kill prey aswell as their teeth, a very odd thing about this unique group of parave is that they posseses an opposable thumb with claws giving them four fingers unlike all paraves that have 3 fingers suggesting through out evolution there ancestors had polydactyly which they were born with a 4th digit that is their clawed thumb and it seems to have a benefit for them in better climbing and interactions so they now naturally continue to evolve their thumbs to become more useful, they also weirdly have a long and flexible tail unlike their parave relatives who have stiff tails, they uses their tails to wrap around tree branches and even uses them to strangle their prey to death, they are very social creatures and tend to be more friendly towards their kind whilst typically hunting alone they do form in a group to take down larger prey that dwells in the forest they live in, males and females bond for life and even raise their youngs until adulthood, Males have more patterns around their scales and feathers then the females and they are also larger than the females, these Paravian dinosaurs are quite a unique group and there could potentionally be more relatives in other enviroment!

Thats about it for the little info on my reimagined Tree Creeper!

As for my thoughts on the creature himself in primeval i ironically love him alot, yeah its just an anthropomorphic scaly raptor but i cant help but love how it looks in the show and they looked badass and it became my n°1 favorite fictional creature of primeval with second being the Future Predator and Future Burrowing insect in third, back when i first saw it as a child it reminded me of the Dinosauroids by Dale A Russell and also the Lizard from Marvel lol, i also enjoyed the episode where the Tree Creeper got introduced it was very fun to watch and to this i still enjoy watching it Primeval will forever be a great part of my childhood!

you can leave your thoughts on my Reimagined Tree Creeper down here i would really appreciate it ^w^!

#primeval #tree creeper #reimagined #raptor #dinosaur #speculative biology #art #speculative ecology

[opashoo]

Speaking of dinosaurs have you heard of CM Kosemen he has alot of series about dinosaurs like "dinosauroids"

I only just looked up his stuff now, but tbh I just love the lore behind dinosauroids. I appreciate Koseman's take on dinosauroids bc he's right, the original imaginings of dinosauroids is way too biased towards a human design.

But this? Simon Roy and Koseman are massive brained for this one

#shark rambles #simon roy #c m koseman #dinosauroid #stenonychosaurus

[virovac]

Honestly feel the Carnivores series could make an okay movie adaptation

Game premise for those unfamiliar: you have paid for privilege hunt alien equivalents of prehistoric Earth Fauna on a plant run by a hunting safari company, who bought the planet after failed colonization attempts. They tried building some facilities on the surface but at this point… from what if can tell it’s mostly just a spaceship comes down to drop off and pick up customers and what they kill or tranquillize. So most facilities are probably orbital or in areas lacking megafauna.

Imagine a scene where skinning a dead wooly mammoth and realizing underneath that hair it really does not look much like an elephant

There are also mysterious arcaheology with ghostly voices, and strange yeti that could be reinterpreted as the classic dumb speculative idea of “dinosauroid” but covered in insulator feathers.

Th T-Rex analogues are also possibly smarter than they seem , since unlike other predators they don’t seem food motivated since they don’t eat the player but beat them to death ,and never get bored or tired to stop chasing you. And they send out calls so more T-Rex’s will join the chase. One broke through a wall of a fort which is part of why attempts at building facilities on the planet stopped.

There was a dropped game idea of poachers: those who didn’t fill out the paperwork and land without permission and without regard for the rules.This gives a perfect human antagonist.

You could easily combine all the that into a plot of the tyrannosaurs as guardians of the planet tied to the strange extinct civilization and a poacher antagonist meeting his end when the plots intersect.

Can maybe incorporate the ice age inspired animals by having the poacher sabotage the ship and cause a crash landing detour, or just give them cameos in trophy rooms or in-universe advertisements

I’m imagining some futuristic satire possible like saying “it’s a good thing companies are more long term in interest since the stock market was abolished, or else the dinosaurs would be extinct again”

Might want to not do references to Stonehenge like in the second game, at this point connecting it to aliens would be silly… but if you make it only superficially like stone henge an make the like solid blocks rather than stacked could fit the weird atmosphere of it being a not-right mirror world, or imply Dinohunt Corp company faked it perhaps trying to further cash in in similarities between Earth and this planets archaeology and provide a landmark for hunters. The fact they don’t have the mysterious voices and are in the area of an abandoned settlement by Dinohunt Corp could add credence.

A fake archaeological site is also in spirit of the community which still has lots of hoaxes to this day with similar energy to “finding Mew under a truck”.

#carnivores dinosaur hunt #carnivores series #movie idea #carnivores 1998 #video game movies

[tribbetherium]

You say you dug up those noncanon concepts for the 2017 beta draft from your files? What other ideas do you have from there, are they also Hamster's Paradise early rejected ideas?

Mostly just a jumble of old rough doodles on an older drawing app whose name I can't even remember, eh I've found Sketch much better anyway.

Most are earlier doodles of the beta Hamster's Paradise post, nothing really new there, though there were also some random art of all sorts of a spec evo grab bag of other ideas I had back then just playing around with speculative evolution tropes, years ago.

Some notable non-Hamster's Paradise ones:

Pentapodal indricothere-like kangaroo descendant that turned its tail into basically a fifth leg. Also some carnivorous macropods that may have influenced the loupgaroos and the harmsters.

An attempt to wyvern-ize a pegasus after hearing some spec evo explanation on why the dragons of Westeros are all wyverns for "realism".

Some big headed baleen whale azhdarchids. How and where and why these could evolve, I have no clue.

A semi "realistic" take on Meowth from Pokemon interpreting it as less of a cat and more of a feline-esque primate with the coin as a brightly-colored display organ. Also probably would involve the heightened intelligence and apparently latent ability to learn human language only some individuals learn.

...whatever the hell this is. I don't even know anymore, it was a long time ago.

Sapient "dinosauroid" descended from probably some generic maniraptoran, with the half-beak and teeth used as a third manipulatory organ. Also long middle fingers for some reason, maybe a scansoriopterygid?

And on the topic of sophonts and manipulatory organs, some attempts at sapient aliens as un-humanoid looking as possible, including some modular bipeds and some kind of triradially symmetric one that uses the eyelids of its three eyestalks as manipulators.

An entirely scrapped project labeled "Lystronia" with the premise of an alternate timeline where the Permian Great Dying was worse and killed the archosaurs and cynodonts too, and with no crocodilians, dinosaurs, pterosaurs or mammals to eventually outcompete them the dicynodont Lystrosaurus took over like it did irl, but then stayed in prominence and dominated the Mesozoic and Cenozoic.

And yep that's basically all, as well as the pop-culture reference one-offs, the planet of the pseudosnakes one, and a Tullimonstrum seed world that went nowhere as we simply didn't know much about what phylum it even is. Hamster's Paradise was the only one that really took off, conceptually.

#ask #speculative zoology #speculative evolution #speculative biology #spec evo #other works

[vees-strangeworld-omniverse]

COMMON DINOSAUROIDS OF THE OMNIVERSE

(NOTE: descriptions copy-pasted from DA where i normally/originally post my works. any context that is missing here on tumblr can be found on my DA [linked here and on pinned post] )

so, like, idk one day i was just in the mood for drawing some of every speculative evolutionist's favorite paleo-related topic. then I realized I had a bunch of dinosauroids I've create in my pre-strangeworld days, and though i'd redesign them as well. thus, all of these guys (except for the ornitimen) are basically just redesigns of mspaint drawing. so, here are a sample of the various sentient archosaurs you'll come across in the omniverse.

a thing to note is that usually all these guys would be wearing clothing or accessories of sort, but i omitted that so you could have a better look at their design.

[tumblr note: also, two of these guys will make mention of Reptilians, or at least this omniverse's version of it. the one linked here is my second rendition; i may end up doing a third rendition, or at least do some minor updates on their descriptions]

troods     troods are your pretty average troodontid-descendant dinosauroid, and they're more specifically a descendant of troodon itself. their universe is your usual non-kpg extinction timeline, though instead of the asteroid missing earth it hits mars instead. being 3ft at the hips, they don't look too far off from your average troodon, either, probably because their ancestors were already smart animal and only needed till the late Oligocene to evolve into a fully-fledge sophonts.     the trood's colors ranges between black, gray, silver and blue, and have darker topside which gradually becomes lighter towards the bottom. they also have a little poof of feathers on their head, which similar to us the females have it more fuller than the males. not much is known about their original culture, say for the fact they were between a hunter-gatherers and permanent civilizations.

ornitimen     contrast to the troods, ornitimen are'nt a naturally-evolved species, rather they're an uplifted sophont that's kinda a weird mix between different small ornithschian species (dryosaurus, kulindadromeus and hypsilophodon being some of the major contributors). they were created by the reptilians, initially being their servants. however, over the century they became less of servants and more of free beings. still, alot of their culture clings onto what they did as servants, especially the arts and labor.     ornitimens have different races, which were created for specific jobs. they stand between 2ft-4ft tall, with the smaller ones being used for art and delicate tasks and larger ones used for hard labor and transportation of items. their colors come in the varying shades, hues and markings of neutral colors, yet always have a colorful neck, which is most vibrant in males.

bevornis     bevornis comes from an alternate version on the trood's universe, in which instead of the troodons becoming the sophonts it was a species of oviraptor. unlike the troods, their initial culture is pretty well known for it's "No bullshit" kind of deal. most bevornids, even females and children, focused on their strength and ability to fight in battles. the children are taught from a young age how to fight and defend themselves. even as their culture expanded beyond battles and wars, they still are often proud of their physical strength.     bevornids look similar to other existing oviraptors, say for their more upright stance. the males have a magenta-ish color on their tail, arms and crest, while the females and children lack those colors. they're roughly the same size as a grown human, if not slightly more robust. their colors can vary depending on race and location, but for the most part it's usually slightly different shades of beige and blonde, still having the dark brown stripes on their face and rear end.

kavoids     kavoids look like one of those generic fantasy feathered dinosaur, with the green body and vibrant feathers. they're some kind of coelurosaur descendant, most likely a compsognathid or something similar. the come from an alternate early-cretaceous period from a small island continent, and they're culture is also a bit of a mystery aside from the fact that females are often more dominant than males.     kavoids stand 4ft at the hips, and are very lean and fast. they have varying hues of green with a yellowish underbelly and darker stripes. they have display feather not only on their tail and arms, but also their spine and head (which is more of a frill). these display feathers are very colorful and vibrant, and are an indicator of individuals and gender; females have their display feathers consist of warm colors, while the male's are more of cool colors.

sapiotyrannus     much like the ornitimen, the sapiotyrannus is an uplifted species created by the reptilians as heavy-labor servants before eventually becoming free beings. unlike the ornitimen, they're not a hybrid of various animals, rather they're a yutyrannus descendant given bigger, more dexterous hands. both sapiotyrannids and ornitimen tend share their civilizations together, since the ornitimen and expert farmers and the sapiotyrannids are vital guardians.    the sapiotyrannus is roughly the same size as it's yutyrannus cousins, and is covered almost entirely by feathers. they're always brownish in colors, with "faun"-like spots going down their back. they're very little difference between sexes, and the only real indicator is that females are slightly bigger than males.

senjias     senjias are the only ones here that aren't actually dinosaur, rather instead they're a descendant of rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur (possible kunpengopterus). coming from an island, they're mostly hunter-gatherers, foraging for both fruits and whatever the ocean gives them. they also go out to sea on little boats so they can fish for whatever they can find.     senjias aren't that big, only standing about 2ft tall. they not only have an opposable thumb, but also an opposable tail. they're also still capable of gliding, which is necessary since they live in the trees. all of them are solid shaded of brown, with a darker mane going on their back. females have red eyes, and males have blue eyes.

man, i need to make more of these guys sometimes.

#sophont #troodon #dinosauroid #pterosaur #sentient #troodontid #tyrannosaurus #feathered dinosaur #ornithischian #oviraptorosaur #tyrannosauridae #coelurosauria #speculative evolution #speculative biology #rhamphorhyncoidea #yutyrannus

[tonkishops]

Ostrich predators

The Dinosauroid was a huge cultural success. Other people took a harder line against Dale’s thought experiment, and thought it was just preposterous that a dinosaur could ever evolve to look anything like a human. I don’t think many people bought into Dale’s specific reconstruction of the animal, but they did think it was an interesting idea. Dale’s dinosauroid was met with mixed reaction by the scientific community. We feel that this is an expectable, viable body form in our thought experiment.Īnd indeed the dinosaur looks more like us than our own ancestors did. It has hands which it uses as tools and feeding devices rather than a jaw. The eyes are focused more directly toward the front than they are in the dinosaur so it probably would have had stereoscopic vision, as we happen to. So as you don’t need the long neck, because you’ve changed your food source, you also don’t need a long tail to counterbalance as you’re trying to chase these things down.Īnd in the case of the brain case, the process of an enlarged brain, had it had 65 million years to accomplish this, would have evolved in a bigger brain case as you see in humans. So if you’re not chasing small critters, then you don’t need the long neck. He was simply applying the processes that he understood were necessary in the evolutionary process. Having done the Troodon model with him, we then proceeded to apply Dale’s interpretation of what would happen in the process of evolution. In the early 1980’s, Dale Russell published a paper about his theory and starting working with taxidermist and model maker, Ron Séguin, to produce models of Troodon and its evolved form: the dinosauroid. How might its evolution have continued for the next 66 million years? This eventually led Dale to wonder: What if Troodon didn’t go extinct at the end of the Cretaceous Period? All these are features that we associate with intelligent animals today. When Dale described the skeleton of this dinosaur, there were a number of features that stood out to him, including the relatively big brain, the large eyes, the bipedal stance, and what he thought was an opposable thumb. Seven times more brainy than an alligator of the equivalent body size. Dale was the first one to make a case that some dinosaurs, particularly small theropod dinosaurs, like Stenonychosaurus as we called it then-I guess it’s Troodon today-was in fact very brainy. When Dale examined the braincase, he noticed that the brain was relatively large-about the size of that of an ostrich.Īt the time, scientists thought dinosaurs were small-brained and dim-witted like most lizards.īut the braincase of Troodon showed that that wasn’t true of all dinosaurs. In 1968, he was shown the braincase of a small meat-eating dinosaur called Troodon in Dinosaur Provincial Park in Alberta. When he became interested in a topic, he had to know all about it, from the outside in, frontwards and backwards.ĭale started with the museum back in 1965, and soon after he started thinking about dinosaur intelligence. This concept of interrupted evolution was at the heart of a controversial thought experiment that took the world of palaeontology by storm in the early 1980’s. When the Chicxulub meteorite hit our planet, it drastically altered the course of life on Earth.īut what if the meteorite had missed our planet, and the dinosaurs had been allowed to evolve undisturbed?ĭale Russell, former paleontologist at the Canadian Museum of Nature, was fascinated by the idea of the evolution of intelligence in dinosaurs. Have you ever wondered what would have happened if the dinosaurs didn’t go extinct 66 million years ago?

#Ostrich predators

[artmakerproductions]

Dino Crisis + Turok

...

TUROK: ReEVOLVED: 

After asking my watchers on DeviantArt, it seems that Turok is the more popular of the two options (the other being Dino Crisis) of which one I give my own new spin on first. Turok being the overall popular choice. For the dinosaurs, I figured that the best way to stand out from the crowd is to go the “accurate” route rather than, as I see it, a copy and paste of the JP dinosaurs or go fully retrosaur (not that I have anything against retrosaurs mind you). Those are just my own thoughts on the matter anyways. Enjoy. 

1) 

- Tyrannosaurus Rex: Your standard tyrannosaur, this beastie is among the top dangers to watch out for. Design based off more current ideas of the dinosaur. Wanted to avoid the "copy and paste" method of repeating the look from Jurassic Park. - Dimetrodon: This intimidating and ferocious synapsid of the Permian era is among the many creatures that found itself in the "Lost Land". - Raptoid: Heavily influenced by the dinosaur humanoid (dinosauroid), but taking into account the modern understanding drodromaeosaurs. One of the several highly evolved species in the Lost Land. - Raptor Mechs: Cubernetic raptors w/ a gun for an arm. What more can I say? 

2) 

More of my takes on the many animals/creatures of the Lost Land, a place outside of time and space where things from the past, present or future may end up at. - Styracosaurus. - Demon (turok.fandom.com/wiki/Demon). - Worm (turok.fandom.com/wiki/Subterra…). - Alien (turok.fandom.com/wiki/Alien_In…).

3) 

- A full body view (and new design) of the Raptoids; a highly evolved descendant of the raptor, from the Turok games.

turok.fandom.com/wiki/Raptoid turok.fandom.com/wiki/Raptoid/…

4) 

- Woolly Mammoth - Irritator (w/ speculative lizard lips that cover the teeth) - Sabre-Toothed Cat (w/ speculative lips) - A seasoned/veteran allosaurus - Quetzalcoatlus 

- Some alternate concepts on the character of Turok, taking inspirations from First Nations culture/people of Canada (which I am by the way, so there’s that :-/ ) opposed to Native Americans over in... well, America. Cause why not? This is just my take after all, so don’t @me. 

5) 

- Turok facing against an unseen threat (a meat-eating dinosaur most likely) for the first time. 

- Killer Plant - Dunkleosteus - Megalodon - Space Lady from the Future: Found herself stranded in the Lost Land, much like Turok, after she and her crew’s ship got pulled into a wormhole out in space. - Turok and one pi$$ed off Carnotaurus

6) 

- Cybernetic T. Rex - Adon (turok.fandom.com/wiki/Adon) - Microraptor, the 4-“winged” dromaeosaur ...

DINO CRISIS: 

Used a more accurate take like w/ my redesign/reboot/whatever of Turok seen earlier, but w/ new and different designs unique for this series in question. For the designs, I made them all mangy and vulture-like to add a bit of "edge" to the dinosaurs so they remain menacing despite the more accurate approach to their appearances. Here, once the dinosaurs enter through the time portals/wormholes created by Third Energy, a side-effect is that the animals act far more aggressive in behaviour and increases hunger. 1) 

- Tyrannosaurus Rex: Added "horns" to give some menace to the rex here.   - (Blue Raptor) Utahraptor - (Velociraptor) Dakotaraptor - Dilophosaurus: To replace the Therizinosaurus in the game, as we now know what they were herbivores (though that doesn't mean they were totally harmless) and FAR bigger in life. So to "fix" this, I chose another dinosaur to fill in the role: dilophosaurus. - Regina, made her slightly older looking (like someone in their 30s or so) by complete accident mind you, but I liked how it turned out so it’s gonna stay. 

2) 

- A raptor making a leap towards Regina who swiftly draws her pistol and takes aim. - Tyrannosaurus, the tyrant lizard king, barges through the window to a surprised Regina, (based off this screenshot: www.scified.com/articles/someo…).

3) 

From left to right; top to bottom. - Giganotosaurus: Don't like the design, personally. Might fox it up later. - Plesiosaurus - Inostrancevia: I gave it speculative lips that cover the teeth. - Mosasaurus - Compsognathus: Took some vague inspiration from the Kiwi Bird in the design. - Oviraptor: Uses the toxins of the foods it eats as defensive by sneezing it at would-be predators (much like marine iguanas sneezing salt). Sexual dimorphism is more prominent here than w/ a simple colour swap. Female to the left; male to the right. - Geosternbergia: The crest of the in-game models + art of the pteranodon reminded me of this other pterosaur, so I traded it out w/ this fellah. - Allosaurus ... Let me know what you think. 👍

#turok #dino crisis #fanart #drawing

[papermonkeyism]

I'm reading up on troodon so that I can learn how to draw them properly, and wikipedia mentions an older theory that had they not gone extinct, they could have evolved to have a human level of intelligence and whatnot. I'm curious, was that part of your inspiration for the much-loved Singing People, or is it just a coincidence?

The dinosauroid? Yup!

I got David Lambert’s book the Ultimate Dinosaur for birthday over two decades ago, and it had a mention of the dinosauroid in it. It’s pretty bullshit, but it left a lasting impression on little me’s brain of Troodon as the most intelligent of ancient dinosaurs (plus having semi-opposable thumbs and stereovision).

For those of you who don’t know, sometime in the eighties a man who’s name escapes me made a theory that if dinosaurs wouldn’t have gone extinct, it would have evolved into a scaly humanoid looking like an alien (big, round head with basically no snout, no tail, plantigrade, three fingered hands… Basically a cross between human and one of those gray aliens, but dinosaur). Pretty bullshit, but it got my attention as a kid. (I mean, if you have evolved for over two hundred million years to perfect bipedal stance with horizontal spine, why on earth would they ever lose their tail to turn vertical instead? The vertical pose is pretty dang broken and we only walk upwards because we can’t balance otherwise as we have no tail. Makes no sense. Also bird brain are structurally different, where mammal brain has the important part being the thin surface layer, birds have that functionality throughout the entire brain, with super tightly packed tiny neurons for extra effectiveness). Plus we actually have a legit, living example of a dinosaur with AT LEAST chimpanzee-level intelligence, and they have no signs at all of ever turning human looking because of that intelligence (magpies and some other corvids)

(Hi, I'm a nerd.)

[dromeoraptor]

(Newly Published Draft) Memoirs- Wild Game

Notes from December 2021 Dromeo: The name Yellowfeather was something I had in my head for a looong time, even back when I was thinking up a story about dinosauroids in an alternate Connecticut. Also the idea was that naming your child after an animal would give them a positive attribute of said animal. “Dad! Dad! Wake up!”, pestered a young voice.  Yellowfeather got up from his cushion. It seemed that he was the person to wake up today.

Yellowfeather was only 14 years old, and he was the youngest of his siblings. His sister, who was only 24, already had children. Sharptail was one of them.  His parents were 50 and 60 years old, old for parents of someone his age. (In the Sagi language, uncles and aunts are fathers and mothers, and nieces and nephews are daughters and sons.)

It seemed that this family had a thing for birds. Yellow was named after a type of finch, and Sharptail was named after a type of swallow. Sharptail said, “Today is the Summer Festival! Come on! You don't wan’t to be late!”Yellow had forgotten that. He quickly put on his shoes and his shirt, and went out the doorway. His shoes were made of leather, and were like gloves; his claws sticked out of the tips. The shirt was also made of leather. 

After taking a quick bath in the river right nest to the village, he got back to his house. His father was sitting on a tree stump. “Today, we’re gonna go down to the beach, and catch ourselves a dire corm.” Today was a special day, not not just because of the solstice festival. Dire corms are considered big game, and once you hunt one yourself, you can no longer be considered a child.

Not long after, they were at the beach. Grey, rough rocks covered the ground, and on that beach, was a colony of dire corms. They were strange birds with loaf-shaped bodies, long necks which supported long, toothy bills, and webbed feet that splayed off to the sides. The smell of rotten seafood filled the air. 

The spear was in his mouth, and a large male, heavier than he was, looked right at him. It was intimidating, even though it could barely move on land, the long neck still frightened him.  The large male, who had been trying to court a female earlier, proving his lack of offspring, hissed at him. They sat there for quite a long while, until eventually, the spear was stabbed right into the corm’s neck. Blood spilled as the bird jerked around for a few seconds, before it died, limp on the ground. 

#worldbuilding #memoir #fictional memoir #flash fiction #unfinished

[dramarising-replacement]

I just wish the staff/artists would take dragon bodies into account when they design apparel.  The swords are awesome in theory but they suck when you consider that if an imp held a katana in it’s hands it’s more likely to slice off it’s own chin than even reach an enemy. And most of them don’t even have wrists that could twist around to use a sword.  It’s not hard to put a longer back on those, make them look like poleaxes instead.

Why didn’t they even design the pommel so that it could be used with the mouth, like they’re saying they’re used when they posted that stupid anime picture in the Q&A?  I think a sabre with a basket guard that would fit around the mouth and protect the muzzle would’ve been awesome and truly different looking.But FR pretty much constantly lets me down by clipping through wings, not even trying to make the different apparel look different on the breeds (lol, what’s a snapper going to play that harp with, his tongue?) and not even using the anatomy limitations they have to design something interesting. (If I see one more imp with clothes with tiny buttons that I know they’d never be able to put on by themselves.)

It isn’t hard to use the anatomy you’re given and make something awesome out of it.  Hell, the dinosauroid guy (Povorot) came up with raptor martial arts, weapons and actual guides for how their muscles worked for Shadowbinder’s sake. It wouldn’t be hard in the slightest to do that for WCs.

The SpearThrower

http://povorot.deviantart.com/art/The-Spear-thrower-114546956

http://www.deviantart.com/art/Dinosauroid-martial-arts-121132071

I just wish the artists were a bit more imaginative in their designs. Their apparel lately is really ordinary, and frankly isn’t better than paper-dolls in making the fits looks interesting.  They just do repeats of would a dragon wear jeans and never consider how in the hell they’d use the bathroom in them….

http://wingsoffirefanon.wikia.com/wiki/File:How_would_a_dragon_wear_pants.png

#rant #flightrising #staff #art #submission

[virovac]

The pterrans [non-official term, no writer has named them] may or may not be in any Mythos stories besides this one. Many of Lovecraft’s tales, and those of his contemporary weird fiction authors whose stories he sometimes traded names and concepts with, mention ancient reptile people from the age of the dinosaurs. If you wanted to, you could say that the reptoids of the Nameless City, or (if you, unlike myself, can reconcile the works of HP Lovecraft and RE Howard without laughing yourself into a coma) the serpent men of Valusia are actually the last, long-surviving descendants of the pterrans. Hell, the Nameless City reptiles even had the sort of semi-quadrapedal movement I ended up giving them. Hmm. Of course, on the other hand, the Mesozoic was a period of time spanning hundreds of millions of years. Easily enough time for multiple, completely unrelated, races of reptile men to evolve, create advanced civilizations, and go extinct without their eras ever overlapping one another. The pterrans may have only been the first of many such dinosauroid or pterosauroid humanoid races. Between the cosabites [the Great Race host bodies], the pterrans [winged black snouted creatures], the beetle race from the distant future, and the possibility of however many other natively evolved sophonts, it looks like Cthulhu Mythos Earth really isn’t such a lonely place at all if you look at the big picture. There are people – people on our own level, who we could easily interact with as equals with mutual understanding – all over the place, all up and down the timestream, and probably on countless worlds. Humanity is trapped in an island of light surrounded by a sea of impassable darkness, but in rare circumstances like Peaslee’s we can see across the darkness, and learn that there are thousands of other islands of light spread all across it through time and space. Even if we can’t reach each other on our own power, just their existence makes the setting feel less bleak.

Leila Hann

Beyond the wide, warm ocean were other cities of the Great Race, and on one far continent I saw the crude villages of the black-snouted, winged creatures who would evolve as a dominant stock after the Great Race had sent its foremost minds into the future to escape the creeping horror.

#cosmic horror #the shadow out of time #lovecraft