Welcome to my Metazoic site! This site discusses the existence of the creatures to come along after humans will be extinct. I first became interested in a world after man when I acquired my first copy of Dougal Dixon's After Man: A Zoology of the Future in 1992. However, I unwittingly created creatures that did not exist from the time I was about 8 years old. But it was after I obtained a copy of that book (now a collector's item) that I decided to take these same creatures I created as a child and make them more realistic in an evolutionary sense. Though it may be hard for a lot of us to grasp, humans will soon become extinct. One of the biggest factors of how this will happen is the current overpopulation rate. Which is why I don't contribute to the population. I created this world with little more than mammals fulfilling all ecological niches with the help of some friends. I even gave the era of the age after man a name, I called it the Metazoic, derived from the words for "After-era" (Meta, meaning after, and zoic meaning era). We are now in the Cenozoic era. To view all the animals I have created since I began this project, you can go to the "Meet the Mammals" section of this site. To discuss your own ideas about what you think will happen in the future world, and share your ideas with others, please feel free to leave a comment.
One more thing, some of you may find this site quite offensive, and you have a right to your own opinion. But please respect my right to have an opinion too. I'm not saying there is no GOD, I believe it was HIM who got the ball rolling. But I believe after that, evolution took over. There is so much more evidence of evolution than there is of creation. Even that going on right under our noses. Other than that, enjoy yourself and visit our many links.

Friday, March 27, 2009

Dinosaurs of Texas

(An interpretation of the site by UTA artist Clinton Crowley)

As long as we are talking about new/unknown and fascinating dinosaur sites in the U.S., I might as well bring up the new Arlington Archosaur Site in Arlington, Texas. This site has garnered a bit of attention in the last few days, and is rather interesting to quite a few people, myself included.

One reason the Arlington Archosaur Site has been given so much attention is because it is in Arlington, Texas. Arlinton is smack dab in the middle of the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, a huge urban area. Most of the time, cities tend to be built on sites that do not contain dinosaur fossils, but Dallas and Fort Worth are exceptions. Like twin magnets, these cities seem to just draw dinosaur fossils to them, resulting in many fantastic dinosaur finds. There have even been dinosaurs found in the DFW airport!

The Arlington Archosaur Site itself is situated in the Woodbine Formation, a strata of rocks dating back to aproximately the Early Cretaceous period, 95 million years ago. Specifically, the site is Cenomanian in age, a period dating back towards the end of the Early Cretaceous. During the Cenomanian, a great inland sea cut North America, and Texas, right down the middle. The Dallas-Fort Worth coast was probably swamps and wetlands, much like the Everglades or the coast of Alabama or Mississippi today.

As the site name would suggest, numerous archosaurs have been found here at this site. One of these is Woodbinesuchus, a thin-snouted crocodile which probably resembled today's gharial. Like the modern gharial, the thin snout of Woodbinesuchus suggests that it was primarily a fish-eater, using its long snout and needle-like teeth to catch fish in the water.

The main dinosaur of the Arlington Archosaur Site is Protohadros. Protohadros is a primitive hadrosaur (or, as contested by some, an advanced hadrosaur-like iguanodontian) known from a skull found in Flower Mound, Texas, also in the Woodbine formation. Technically, we are not totally sure if the hadrosaur here is Protohadros, as the only other Protohadros specimen is known from the skull, which this specimen is lacking, but the general anatomy and the fact that no other hadrosaurs are known from the Woodbine formation suggest that it is Protohadros. Even better, the atlas vertebra of this animal has been found, which is a good indicator that the skull is also in the ground, merely awaiting excavation.

In addition to Protohadros, there have been several fossils of a theropod dinosaur found at the site. However, unlike Protohadros, these fossils are as of yet unable to be identified down to the generic level, or any further than "theropod". Theropods are unknown from the Woodbine formation, so hopefully more material of this animal will be found so science will be able to figure out what this animal is.

Only one question remainds. The site is called the Arlington Archosaur Site, but there have been turtles found there. So...that would make it the Arlington Aminote Site? But then there's that new species of lungfish....
Links
References
http://www.lonestardinosaurs.org/
http://www.arlingtonarchosaursite.com/
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/03/090318-texas-dinosaurs.html
Lone Star Dinosaurs by Louis L. Jacobs and Karen Carr

1 comment:

Ulrikek Nauer said...

Hi great reading your bllog