Terrible Lizards

Dinosaur Bites 002 Terrible Lizards Podcast returns with a discussion on dinosaur colours, and Compsognathus, from a 2021 live session. We talk about the preservation of dinosaur colours is limited to certain pigments and while some colours may not preserve well, the organisation of melanosomes is a more significant factor. And candidate for the cutest dinosaurs: Compsognathids, a group of small theropod dinosaurs, are often found as juveniles, leading to uncertainty about their phylogenetic placement. We discuss Andrea Cau's hypothesises that they may not be what they seem!

Direct video link: https://youtu.be/5wGuzaJ16M8

For more bonus content and to get your questions answered: https://www.patreon.com/terriblelizards

Also apologies for the audio glitches - when we talked over each other it became incomprehensible - so it was shoddily repaired by iszi.

A short extract from a live we did back in 2021 about these two new #spinosaur species: Riparovenator and Ceratosuchops.

If you want to find out more about these animals please listen to the free full episode on youtube: https://youtu.be/jO6gyw-onBY?si=qHQ6oJ0wnqxJAaX- or find 'TLS05E01 Riparovenator and Ceratosuchops' on your podcast feed. https://terriblelizards.libsyn.com/tls05e01-riparovenator-and-ceratosuchops

Terrible Lizards a podcast about #dinosaurs with Dr Dave Hone and Iszi Lawrence. It is released on the last wednesday of the month and there is a large back catalogue.

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5Ud7Vyrmvx9zUBLcXjiSSl?si=4d37e2a2fe3e4319

We will be releasing Terrible Lizards Dinobites intermittently too: to help promote the show - so if you enjoyed this do like and share and leave a review.

For more info and bonus material and videos go to: www.patreon.com/terriblelizards

Thanks to our wonderful Patrons we are planning video as well as audio versions of the podcast from now on! Just as we have for the Bonus Episodes. (N.B. Sometimes video may not be possible but we are hoping it will be! We are still a two-man-with-occasional-help-from-Simon band. )

If you want to watch this podcast rather than just listen head to iszitube: https://youtu.be/5w83FHoFU7Q

We will also be releasing the Bonus Episode on the second Wednesday of the month so that the content is a little more spaced out.

Thank you EVERYONE for your amazing questions. Phil, James, Jay, Paul, Keren, Bethany, M'Challo, Victoria R, Christopher, TriSarahtops, Livefree13, Raptor Josh, Adam, Daniel, Alexander, Marcus, Roy and Summer!

As well as everyone who donated on patreon.com/terriblelizards.

You can get in touch with us via www.patreon.com/terriblelizards Thank you for supporting science communication and being so friendly and passionate about the podcast. It means a LOT to us.

The biggest news in palaeontology this year dropped just in time for us to miss it with last month's episode but we're giving it the full hour this time. The idea that there's a miniature tyrannosaur running around in the Late Cretaceous alongside Tyrannosaurus has long been a contentious one, with most palaeontologists favouring the interpretation that the specimens represented juvenile rexes. But a huge new paper presents a brand-new specimen that shows various unique features and importantly, is an adult animal while still small. Join Dave and Iszi into a deep dive on the history of these ideas ad why people are switching sides to support the idea that Nanotyrannus is real. One of the better articles from the media storm:

Nanotyrannus isn't a 'mini T. Rex' after all — it's a new species, 'dueling dinosaurs' fossil reveals | Live Science:

https://www.livescience.com/animals/dinosaurs/i-was-wrong-dinosaur-scientists-agree-that-small-tyrannosaur-nanotyrannus-was-real-pivotal-new-study-finds

Please support the podcast and submit questions for our end of year megasode: https://www.patreon.com/terriblelizards

Dave has *another* book coming out and so of course he wants to talk about it a bit on the pod. Happily for the listeners, this time out he has a coauthor and so we get to have palaeontologist and palaeoartist Mark Witton on as well so that Iszi has some support for once. The new book is on that most controversial of dinosaurs, Spinosaurus and its allies, and what we know, and what we don't, and where the research is taking us. Given its insane media profile and the attention it attracts, as well as the back-and-forth in the scientific literature over its bizarre features, this is an animal well overdue a proper popular science book. So here it is, written by Dave and Mark, and with Mark's extensive illustrations throughout. But for now you can enjoy the chat about this animal and how the work came to be.

Links:

For Bonus content: https://www.patreon.com/terriblelizards

Mark's website with links to his blog and other pages

Home | MarkWitton.co.uk

An old blogpost of Dave's which looks at the main controversies of Spinosaurus swimming

The evidence for Spinosaurus being a specialist aquatic predator and good swimmer is weak | Dave Hone's Archosaur Musings

Long time listener and second time guest Darren Naish joins us to talk about marine reptiles. While Darren is best known for his work on dinosaurs and pterosaurs, he has fingers in a huge number of vertebrate pies, and he has a new edition out of his book on all of the Mesozoic monsters that lived in the sea. So, strap in for an incredibly being tour of mosasaurs, mesosaurs, placodonts, ichthyosaurs, plesionsaurs, thalattosaurs, thalattosuchians and we even manage to sneak in a reference to certain allegedly semi-aquatic large theropods.

Support us on www.patreon.com/terriblelizards

Check out iszi's NEW podcast about Egyptology www.talklikeanegyptian.com

A link to Darren's Home page which combines links to the blog, podcast, con and other resources.

https://tetzoo.com/

A link to Darren's post on the launch of the first edition:

https://tetzoo.com/blog/2023/2/27/ancient-sea-reptiles-is-out-now

A link to the Natural History Museum shop for the book:

https://www.nhmshop.co.uk/ancient-sea-reptiles-plesiosaurs-ichthyosaurs-mosasaurs-more.html?srsltid=AfmBOorc2zt792sWSVYdef8-O5zKci9w2Fiu6FhLlpX_lEATiWy1Gsn0

Disaster with the recording this episode! Sorry if it is hard to hear in places we were forced to use the emergency back up! Disaster with the recording this episode! Sorry if it is hard to hear in places we were forced to use the emergency back up!

Listeners may remember that Dave went to Utah a couple of years back to try and help with a sauropod excavation. That trip was with sauropod supremo Matt Wedel who was recently in London, and so we scooped him up to get him onto Terrible Lizards. Unfortunately there were real technical issues, so the sound quality is not the best, but hopefully you can enjoy it. So sit back for an hour for deep sauropod nerdery, covering the air sac system, giant sauropods, their evolution, ecology, and follow Matt's career from a chance start on a new giant to bird physiology.

A link to Matt's blog SV-POW! which he writes with Mike Taylor (and in theory, Darren Naish)

https://svpow.com/

A link to an old post from Matt on Dave's blog about his favourite work:

https://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2017/02/27/buried-treasure-matt-wedel/

Iszi's book The Time Machine Next Door: inventors and dinosaurs is out on 28th August in the UK: https://amzn.eu/d/dqPr6bo

Pterosaur soft tissues

It's a double new paper episode this time as thanks to the magic of almost random review and publication times, Dave has two papers out on the same subject in the same month! So strap in for some absolute minutiae on pterosaur hands, feet, scales, and the oddly overlooked wing membrane that sits between their legs. Pterosaurs in general are not very common fossils and so it should be no surprise that we don't have a great many examples of their soft tissues, from skin, to beaks and claws and other bits. So, having new examples, and synthesising the limited information we have, is really important for building an understanding of these incredible animals. It's deep dive time.

A link to Dave's blogpost on the new hand and foot scale papers:

https://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2025/06/10/new-data-on-pterosaurian-soft-tissues/

A link to a very old blogpost about pterosaur soft tissues generally:

https://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2008/07/25/pterosaur-soft-tissues/

Iszi'a new book - featuring a pterosaur and perfect for 6-9 year olds is out on 28th August in the UK: https://amzn.eu/d/9kFiniD (message her on iszi.com if you want international posting).

June, rather incredibly, marks the fifth anniversary of the launch of series 1, episode 1 of the podcast. As a rather fortuitous bit of timing, we were invited to host a live Terrible Lizards event at Lyme Regis (home of Mary Anning) for their Fossil Festival. We could hardly say 'no', so here is a recording of that hour long session where we fielded a ton of questions from the audience (that was overflowing out of the room!) and even included a few professional palaeontologists in the audience to put a bit more pressure on Dave's answers. A good time was apparently had by all, maybe this will happen again next year?

A link to the Fossil Festival website. Stay tuned for next year's details: https://fossilfestival.com/

For extra content go to patreon.com/terriblelizards

Curating Dinosaurs II Curate Harder! On this episode we welcome Jordan Mallon, a long-time collaborator of Dave's and, against the odds, a long-time listener of Terrible Lizards. While we talk about Jordan's research and career in this pod, and his work on dinosaur sizes and ecology, this one also serves as something of a sequel to our previous episode. That's because he is also the curator of the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa, the national natural history museum of Canada. It's a much more typical collection than the one we talked about last time out, so join us to learn more about how museum's work, the importance of the behind-the-scenes jobs that people do, and

Links:

Support us and get extra content:

https://www.patreon.com/terriblelizards

A short interview Jordan did with Dave years ago:

https://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2017/03/06/buried-treasure-jordan-mallon/

A blogpost by Dave on his paper with Jordan on giant T. rex.

https://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2024/07/24/on-the-trail-of-giant-tyrannosaurus-rex/

Jordan's webpage at the Canadian Museum of Nature

https://nature.ca/en/our-science/science-experts/jordan-mallon/