WEBVTT

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lost in the fog of a cosmic storm floating on

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whimsical wavelengths is the norm dancing through

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the stars chasing spectrums of light riding the

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waves that are just out Welcome back. It's been

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a minute since we here on Whimsical Wavelengths

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last traveled through geologic time to look at

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prehistoric life. Instead of looking at Jurassic

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Park and theropods like the king of the Mesozoic

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T -Rex back in season one today, we're going

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to take to the prehistoric skies. Flight has

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evolved at least three separate times over the

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history of life here on our blue marble called

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Earth. First, with insects. in the Carboniferous.

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We actually poked at this back in Season 1 with

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Dr. Hollister, when looking at the respiratory

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systems of insects. Second to Evolve Flight is

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actually the focus of today's topic, with a guest.

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Petrosaurs, related to dinosaurs, as both belong

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to the same clade, Archosaurus. I think I need

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a refresher on the terminology and how they fit

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together in the evolutionary tree, but a clade

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is defined as a group of organisms believed to

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have evolved from a common ancestor, as measured

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by the characteristics of those organisms. Archeosaurs

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include dinosaurs, petrosaurs, crocodilians,

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and other mesozoic groups. And I'll circle back

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to geological time periods in just a moment.

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The third is da birds. evolving from small theropods

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with feathers approximately 150 million years

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ago. Finally, the fourth and most recent is mammals.

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Bats are the only mammal to evolve true flight.

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There is fossil evidence for gliders back to

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160 million years ago, as far as mammals are

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concerned, but the oldest fossil of a bat, a

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true flyer, we have is about 52 .5 million years

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old. And petrosaurs are not like bats and birds.

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Their wings were supported by a single, elongated

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fourth finger. You could say they were always

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giving everyone the finger. Don't worry, I know

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my petrosur comedy is terrible, and this joke

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did not take off. So, quick orientation in geological

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time for today's discussion. We divide the age

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of the Earth into categories based on changes

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in the ecology and the processes found in the

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rock. Most large changes we see... To make these

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dividing lines are due to large events, which

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also tend to cause extinctions. Our current eon,

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the Cenozoic, is the time of mammals, beginning

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66 million years ago, after the large impactor

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caused a mass extinction that brought down the

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dinosaurs, all the way up to the present, 66

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million years. The eon called the Mesozoic, starting

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back at that impactor 66 million years ago, back

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to 251 .9 million years at the Permian and Triassic

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extinction event. The Mesozoic covers the rise

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and fall of dinosaurs and many others, like petrosaurs.

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Because, you see, before birds were cool, there

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were petrosaurs. They first came on the evolutionary

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scene at approximately the same time as the first

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mammals, in the late Triassic, over 220 million

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years ago, and were part of the skies until the

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end of the Cretaceous, 66 million years ago,

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when that large extinction event, also known

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as the KPG event, occurred, wiping out all non

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-avian dinosaurs. Today, we're going to get...

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into them, specifically petrosaurs, and a member

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of this group that was recently found and described,

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Haliska Pettersenai. And I'm probably pronouncing

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that wrong, but don't worry, the guest will correct

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me. And I am absolutely ecstatic to dive in and

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learn more about prehistoric life and research

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in paleontology, and I'm so glad the lead author

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for the study, Haliska Pettersenai Anu Anaguerian,

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petrosaur from the late early cretaceous of australia

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published in nature's scientific reports okay

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so welcome my guest today is a stem communicator

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being involved with bringing scientific results

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to museum exhibits has consulted on scientific

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accuracy on dinosaur stamps a children's book

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and much much more please welcome phd candidate

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adele pentland hopefully i'm pronouncing that

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right a recent graduate boat to graduate from

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Curtin University. Yeah, thank you so much for

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that wonderful introduction. So kind of in the

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back and forth as we led up to this interview,

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you told me the PhD thesis was submitted. Now,

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obviously, I had different ideas of what that

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meant. I thought you had finished your defense.

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But I mean, the writing part is usually the least

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fun part of the degree because it's like all

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consuming. How did you manage to cope to get

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through it? Oh, so I kind of like broke it down

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into stages. So yeah, writing a thesis, which

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I think, and this varies from institution to

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institution, but I think it's generally accepted

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that a thesis is between 75 ,000 to 100 ,000

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words. But I've been really fortunate in that

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I did my PhD part time, while I spent most of

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the time living on a 32 ,500 acre sheep and cattle

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station. But I also, throughout that process,

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was really conscious that I wanted to share these

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results basically as soon as I could. And to

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do that effectively meant publishing papers along

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the way. So yeah, sort of in an unusual situation

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of having seven lead author papers out. And it

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just meant that I had a different set of problems

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when putting the thesis together in terms of...

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like jumping through different hoops and making

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sure that I wasn't infringing on the copyright

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of the publishers who in a weird way kind of

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like own the work now or they're distributing

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the work and also yeah just trying to work out

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which version of a manuscript I could use in

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instances where the paper hadn't been published

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in open access so yeah it wasn't a whole heap

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of writing although one of the requirements for

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mine was putting together a comprehensive list

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of all of the references throughout the entire

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document which was about like four no it was

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600 different references and i think maybe 30

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or 40 pages that was a massive pain in the butt

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yeah reference lists are my least favorite part

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of any paper uh putting it together so i guess

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um Just going from my own experience, there's

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like generally, I mean, there's more than this,

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but there's two general types of theses. There's

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the story thesis and there's the paper thesis.

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And I guess yours falls under the second one

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where you have individual chapters or literally

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submitted papers instead of each chapter kind

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of leading to an overall story. Yeah, correct.

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I would love to have had that sort of wonderful,

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like overarching thing that just kind of like.

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fed one into the next but the fact of the matter

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is the project kind of got started because fossils

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were being found at different locations and then

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in terms of like a null hypothesis it's you know

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is this new fossil that's been discovered is

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it a new species if not what is it if it is new

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okay amazing but what is it related to and just

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kind of going from there so my thesis was called

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early to mid cretaceous pterosaurs from eastern

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australia so focusing on fossils that were found

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in queensland as well as victoria um i had hoped

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to work on some of the opalized fossils from

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lightning ridge in new south wales but i just

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sort of ran out of time um towards the end but

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yeah basically just trying to work out Okay,

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what is happening as Australia is part of this

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massive supercontinent called Gondwana, but I'm

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working on a group that have these wingspans

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of, you know, several meters. Most of the pterosaurs

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I worked on had like four or 4 .6 meter wingspans,

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which is equivalent to 13 feet or 15 feet. So

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they're massive animals. They can fly across

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the oceans easily, but... Is that what the fossils

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are telling us? So just trying to piece that

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together and I suppose reverse engineer it and

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work out what kind of a narrative can I string

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together with all of these things to make it

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make sense. That must have been quite difficult.

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Although your thesis title seemed pretty straightforward

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in the end of it. All as some others like my

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own. Yeah, I just kind of, I mean. For some PhDs,

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their project title and the scope of their project

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can change as they get through it, depending

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on, you know, different challenges and stumbling

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blocks. But I was sort of fortunate in that.

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That was the idea for the project, and then I

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was able to execute and work with different partners,

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whether they be regional natural history museums,

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whether they be folks who are instrument scientists

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at the Australian Synchrotron to basically shoot

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lasers and generate high -powered x -rays of

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the fossils that I was studying. At one point,

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we did take a couple of fossils to a hospital

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to get them CT scanned, just with medical CT.

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And yeah, international collaborators as well.

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So yeah, really fortunate in that what I set

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out to do, which was describe some new fossils

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that was able to sort of come together. And I

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think I got you here to talk about one fossil

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in particular. And I also know that you've done

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all kinds of scientific consulting to... stem

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pen pals even um and i want to get into all of

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that but i think maybe the technical topic needs

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to be teed up first pterosaurs you've already

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mentioned them um but for the listeners who may

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not be coming from paleontology what were they

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and how did they fit into the their brethren

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the dinosaurs that everyone remembers Yeah, so

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a lot of people probably have a sense of what

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a pterosaur is, or they might be scratching their

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head and wondering, oh, why is she saying pterosaur

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and not pterodactyl? And they might also have

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the misconception that these are flying dinosaurs,

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but they're not. So pterosaurs, they did live

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at the same time as the dinosaurs, and they are

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an extinct group that were wiped out. about 66

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million years ago at the end of the cretaceous

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period when a meteorite smacked into what is

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now the gulf of mexico the earth had a really

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bad day uh so pterosaurs have been around since

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about 220 million years ago they first pop off

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in the triassic period and even those earliest

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fossils they're very distinct they're very weird

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so we are still trying to understand what their

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early origins look like. Mark Whitten has done

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some beautiful speculative drawings of these

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gliding reptiles. But essentially, they're a

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really weird group, that's why I love them so

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much. Pterosaurs also include the largest animals

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to ever take to the skies. Quetzalcoatlus Northropi

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was a beast that, when walking around, stood

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as tall as a giraffe and had a wingspan about

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the size of a small plane. It's absolutely bonkers.

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It probably had a 10 -meter wingspan. So to me,

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one of the massive joys about studying this group

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is that it really highlights how different and

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bizarre past life has been. And when you find

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the fossil, of something that was as big as Quetzalcoatlus.

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And you understand that it did fly. It just kind

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of busts open any preconceived notions that you

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have about what is physically possible. But yeah,

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as I kind of touched on before, pterosaurs are

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distinct from dinosaurs. Most people agree that

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they're closely related to dinosaurs and together

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they form a clade called Ornithodira. But...

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They've got a couple key differences that distinguish

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them from dinosaurs. And that's in the shape

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of their shoulder girdle, their forelimbs, which

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are modified wings, and also their pelvis. But

00:13:32.460 --> 00:13:34.399
all that to say, basically the biggest thing

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is that pterosaurs have basically... modified

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their arms into being wings so they have a humerus

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they have an upper arm bone they have a radius

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and ulna which are the two bones in the forearm

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that we have but then most of their wing is actually

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made up of their ring finger which is stretched

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out and super long and that supports a membrane

00:13:56.110 --> 00:14:00.230
of skin so like in some ways their wing is sort

00:14:00.230 --> 00:14:04.629
of similar to a bat but it's september as we

00:14:04.629 --> 00:14:08.360
recall no oh my gosh it's now october Or it's

00:14:08.360 --> 00:14:10.940
October for me. It's still September for me.

00:14:11.080 --> 00:14:12.580
Yeah, it's still September for me. It's spooky

00:14:12.580 --> 00:14:15.080
season. It's spooky season. So if you go out

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to the shops and you have a look at, like, plastic

00:14:18.519 --> 00:14:22.399
Halloween decorations, you can kind of see in

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a bat wing, they've got the five bones of the

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hand that are spread throughout that wing. Whereas

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a pterosaur toy shouldn't have that. Most do,

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but it should just be like bones that form the

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leading edge and just a membrane of skin that

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then attaches to the ankle. So really different

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wing structure to bats and yeah, super different

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to birds as well. Yeah, that's the main thing

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that sort of makes them different. Even like

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the gliding dinosaurs, like Ichi, I think its

00:14:58.659 --> 00:15:01.740
wing structure is really different to a pterosaur

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wing. How common were these animals then? Like,

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did they fill lots of the ecological niches that

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birds do today from predator all the way to like

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scavengers and grazers and the whole nine yards?

00:15:15.320 --> 00:15:18.820
Oh, that's a really juicy question. And it's

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really difficult to work that out because like

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birds, pterosaurs had hollow bones. So most pterosaurs

00:15:27.580 --> 00:15:31.019
like that. The outer wall of the bone is only

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one millimeter thick. And then it's mostly hollow

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with these thin connective struts on the inside.

00:15:37.799 --> 00:15:41.480
They're designed, they've evolved. They've evolved

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to be as light as possible so that they can get

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up into the air. But because of that, those bones

00:15:48.340 --> 00:15:51.500
can easily get broken before they get fossilized.

00:15:51.639 --> 00:15:54.559
And even as fossils, once they're exposed to

00:15:54.559 --> 00:15:58.159
the surface, if... the hollow bits aren't just

00:15:58.159 --> 00:16:01.200
completely filled with rock on the inside then

00:16:01.200 --> 00:16:05.759
they get smashed up really easily so in general

00:16:05.759 --> 00:16:10.500
it's really hard to work out how common or abundant

00:16:10.500 --> 00:16:14.139
a group is just based on the fossils that you

00:16:14.139 --> 00:16:17.480
have you can't really do like a one for one because

00:16:17.480 --> 00:16:20.899
if we think of what are the most common animals

00:16:20.899 --> 00:16:24.039
in our environment today they're insects And

00:16:24.039 --> 00:16:27.059
they're very, very small insects. And yet there's

00:16:27.059 --> 00:16:30.120
only a handful of deposits, like lake deposits,

00:16:30.179 --> 00:16:34.320
where you might have a bias towards a lot of

00:16:34.320 --> 00:16:37.139
the larval stage. But you won't be seeing lots

00:16:37.139 --> 00:16:40.379
of the very, very small vinegar flies, we call

00:16:40.379 --> 00:16:45.279
them, and things like that. So yeah, and it gets

00:16:45.279 --> 00:16:48.259
super complicated as you do stuff with pterosaurs.

00:16:48.440 --> 00:16:51.600
But to answer your question, pterosaurs... did

00:16:51.600 --> 00:16:55.620
have a range of diets so some ate insects it's

00:16:55.620 --> 00:16:57.879
been suggested that quite a lot ate fish some

00:16:57.879 --> 00:17:01.100
have been suggested as eating um as being scavengers

00:17:01.100 --> 00:17:05.839
there's a few that are regarded as eating fruit

00:17:05.839 --> 00:17:10.980
i'm not as familiar with seeds but i'm also just

00:17:10.980 --> 00:17:13.119
because i'm not a paleobotanist i'm also just

00:17:13.119 --> 00:17:15.380
trying to scratch my head and think oh like how

00:17:15.380 --> 00:17:20.480
common were seeds at this point because Even

00:17:20.480 --> 00:17:23.440
during the Cretaceous period. Well, during the

00:17:23.440 --> 00:17:26.119
Cretaceous period, flowering plants or angiosperms

00:17:26.119 --> 00:17:28.880
are just sort of like getting started. Whereas

00:17:28.880 --> 00:17:33.099
today, angiosperms are, I think it's over 90

00:17:33.099 --> 00:17:36.099
% of land plants. A lot of our most important

00:17:36.099 --> 00:17:39.839
crops are types of angiosperms. But back in the

00:17:39.839 --> 00:17:43.099
Cretaceous period, you have sort of more like

00:17:43.099 --> 00:17:50.240
conifers and ginkgos and cycads. they don't have

00:17:50.240 --> 00:17:54.180
like fruit like the botanical definition of fruit

00:17:54.180 --> 00:17:57.279
but they can have like seeding bodies and stuff

00:17:57.279 --> 00:18:00.460
but then in terms of the nutrition of them i'm

00:18:00.460 --> 00:18:05.619
not sure um but yeah i it's also interesting

00:18:05.619 --> 00:18:10.119
as well because for part of their evolutionary

00:18:10.119 --> 00:18:14.650
history birds and pterosaurs coexisted So even

00:18:14.650 --> 00:18:17.470
though pterosaurs evolved flight like 65 million

00:18:17.470 --> 00:18:21.049
years before birds did, there's been quite a

00:18:21.049 --> 00:18:24.410
lot of research that has been trying to examine

00:18:24.410 --> 00:18:29.490
whether the reason why, you know, pterosaurs

00:18:29.490 --> 00:18:32.150
went extinct, is it because they were outcompeted

00:18:32.150 --> 00:18:35.549
by birds and things like that? Which again is,

00:18:35.569 --> 00:18:42.210
is like a whole other kettle of fish. Right.

00:18:43.529 --> 00:18:47.930
Huh. So I guess just to sum that up is there's

00:18:47.930 --> 00:18:49.769
a lot we don't know because we don't have a lot

00:18:49.769 --> 00:18:52.690
of information from the rock record being preserved,

00:18:52.970 --> 00:18:56.789
but it seems like they did at least have different

00:18:56.789 --> 00:19:01.390
ways of feeding and providing itself to essentially

00:19:01.390 --> 00:19:03.589
could be different ecological niches, but we

00:19:03.589 --> 00:19:09.190
need more information to fine -tune that. Or

00:19:09.190 --> 00:19:12.470
something. Yeah, so direct evidence is super

00:19:12.470 --> 00:19:15.569
rare. That goes across the board with fossils.

00:19:15.789 --> 00:19:18.529
I should also shout out that there are some really

00:19:18.529 --> 00:19:21.029
weird pterosaurs that were filter feeders. They

00:19:21.029 --> 00:19:24.190
had almost like a baleen, but it was made out

00:19:24.190 --> 00:19:28.029
of hundreds of thousands of needle -thin teeth.

00:19:28.150 --> 00:19:32.470
It's called Pterodostro. It's known from multiple

00:19:32.470 --> 00:19:36.859
individuals. They found an embryo. In an egg

00:19:36.859 --> 00:19:39.519
of this, they basically know what every single

00:19:39.519 --> 00:19:42.339
bone in Pterodostro's body looks like from multiple

00:19:42.339 --> 00:19:46.000
specimens. And yeah, they think they were filter

00:19:46.000 --> 00:19:49.839
feeders. They have gastrolyths as well. So Pterodostro

00:19:49.839 --> 00:19:52.779
was actually swallowing stones intentionally

00:19:52.779 --> 00:19:56.660
to try and grind up some of the really tough

00:19:56.660 --> 00:19:59.559
material that it was eating. So things like...

00:19:59.819 --> 00:20:02.220
things with hard shells, so crustaceans and things

00:20:02.220 --> 00:20:04.640
like that. And for that reason, some paleo artists

00:20:04.640 --> 00:20:07.819
love showing pterodactyls being pink like a flamingo,

00:20:07.839 --> 00:20:13.480
which I'm super into. Okay, well, we're here

00:20:13.480 --> 00:20:16.400
to talk about one special pterosaur, and it's

00:20:16.400 --> 00:20:18.039
not one of the special ones you've already mentioned,

00:20:18.099 --> 00:20:21.480
I don't think, anyway. Who is it, and how was

00:20:21.480 --> 00:20:25.480
it found? Yeah, so I'm definitely not biased.

00:20:25.519 --> 00:20:29.000
I definitely don't play favorites. But, yeah.

00:20:29.500 --> 00:20:32.339
Last year, I named a second species of pterosaur.

00:20:32.480 --> 00:20:35.599
It's the most complete in Australia. I definitely,

00:20:35.839 --> 00:20:39.339
as a Simpsons fan, have not created the, like,

00:20:39.359 --> 00:20:43.799
homo, like, pushing the lamb away meme and included

00:20:43.799 --> 00:20:46.920
it with, like, my pterosaur boys' names. So,

00:20:47.079 --> 00:20:51.539
Halyschia peterseni is a 22 % complete skeleton

00:20:51.539 --> 00:20:55.720
that was found in November 2021. It's hard to

00:20:55.720 --> 00:20:58.460
believe that it's already been. a few years since

00:20:58.460 --> 00:21:03.019
it was first discovered uh but and someone reached

00:21:03.019 --> 00:21:07.960
the most complete at only 22 percent hey yeah

00:21:07.960 --> 00:21:13.220
yeah so um it's really rare that you find like

00:21:13.220 --> 00:21:17.299
a complete pterosaur like even the slab specimens

00:21:17.299 --> 00:21:21.519
from the jihel biota in china where you can see

00:21:21.519 --> 00:21:26.880
basically the entire animal Often you can't actually

00:21:26.880 --> 00:21:30.460
see like every single tail vertebrae down to

00:21:30.460 --> 00:21:33.000
the end. And normally you can't see the gastralia

00:21:33.000 --> 00:21:37.259
or which are the floating ribs. So yeah, even

00:21:37.259 --> 00:21:39.259
in those instances where something's complete,

00:21:39.339 --> 00:21:43.740
normally those bones don't fossilize because...

00:21:44.640 --> 00:21:47.980
They're either very small or they're just not

00:21:47.980 --> 00:21:50.339
very well ossified in the skeleton, so what I

00:21:50.339 --> 00:21:52.660
mean by that is that there might be cartilage.

00:21:53.119 --> 00:21:55.680
But yeah, it's just a constant work in progress.

00:21:57.680 --> 00:22:01.460
Honestly, before I worked on Heliskia, there

00:22:01.460 --> 00:22:05.000
was only one other pterosaur specimen in Australia

00:22:05.000 --> 00:22:08.319
known from a partial skeleton. Which is, again,

00:22:08.380 --> 00:22:11.680
another one that I named in 2019. So yeah, there's

00:22:11.680 --> 00:22:14.839
lots of room for improvement. And when I visit

00:22:14.839 --> 00:22:18.059
schools and stuff in various capacities wearing

00:22:18.059 --> 00:22:21.259
different hats, I love saying to them, we have

00:22:21.259 --> 00:22:24.059
five pterosaurs in Australia. I've named two

00:22:24.059 --> 00:22:26.859
of them within the last however many years. Just

00:22:26.859 --> 00:22:29.240
imagine how many are out there, and maybe one

00:22:29.240 --> 00:22:32.819
of you will find the next best complete pterosaur.

00:22:34.670 --> 00:22:38.390
But yeah, for the moment, we have Holiskia. It

00:22:38.390 --> 00:22:44.369
was found by a gent called Kevin Peterson. At

00:22:44.369 --> 00:22:47.450
the time, he was the curator at Kronosaurus Corner,

00:22:47.670 --> 00:22:50.930
which is a regional natural history museum in

00:22:50.930 --> 00:22:54.369
Outback Queensland. And yeah, part of his job

00:22:54.369 --> 00:22:59.029
was going out to a publicly accessible dig site

00:22:59.029 --> 00:23:03.619
and seeing what he could find. And then... at

00:23:03.619 --> 00:23:07.140
this actual other site some of the guys from

00:23:07.140 --> 00:23:11.059
the council contacted him having made this discovery

00:23:11.059 --> 00:23:15.480
and even from those first photos that he sent

00:23:15.480 --> 00:23:18.119
to me on instagram i could see there was a complete

00:23:18.119 --> 00:23:21.180
lower jaw in the ground which we just never had

00:23:21.180 --> 00:23:25.900
in australia and then as when the specimen was

00:23:25.900 --> 00:23:29.000
recovered and taken back to the lab and he was

00:23:29.000 --> 00:23:31.930
doing more preparation work They're using fine

00:23:31.930 --> 00:23:34.569
tools to remove the rock that was covering more

00:23:34.569 --> 00:23:37.950
of the bones. He said to me one day, oh, there's

00:23:37.950 --> 00:23:40.690
like a bone that looks like a thin piece of spaghetti.

00:23:40.910 --> 00:23:43.230
And I was like, I know exactly what that is.

00:23:43.390 --> 00:23:47.230
It was a really thin, delicate bone in the throat

00:23:47.230 --> 00:23:50.490
called the serratobranchial. And just knowing

00:23:50.490 --> 00:23:53.109
that you have such fine, delicate bones, which

00:23:53.109 --> 00:23:57.130
often don't fossilize, was just, yeah, super

00:23:57.130 --> 00:23:59.670
special. And I knew we had something good on

00:23:59.670 --> 00:24:02.230
our hands. Awesome. There's nothing like the

00:24:02.230 --> 00:24:04.450
discovery of something new, especially in science.

00:24:04.549 --> 00:24:08.329
It's kind of what we do in science. Let's jump

00:24:08.329 --> 00:24:11.069
into the actual paper that came with this and

00:24:11.069 --> 00:24:13.589
where you introduce this to the rest of the world

00:24:13.589 --> 00:24:17.069
outside of the small circle that found it. And

00:24:17.069 --> 00:24:19.990
I'm going to totally embarrass myself here. So

00:24:19.990 --> 00:24:23.609
I did the rock side of things. I stayed away

00:24:23.609 --> 00:24:26.349
from chemistry and biology because I didn't know

00:24:26.349 --> 00:24:28.470
how to spell. Yeah, that was the reason for taking

00:24:28.470 --> 00:24:31.630
geophysics. So I also don't understand species

00:24:31.630 --> 00:24:34.089
classification in evolutionary groups very much.

00:24:34.390 --> 00:24:38.710
So I'm going to attempt to pronounce these. And

00:24:38.710 --> 00:24:41.549
after that, I would love a retelling or an explanation

00:24:41.549 --> 00:24:43.990
of how or what the factors and characteristics

00:24:43.990 --> 00:24:48.089
that were used to determine the zoological taxonomy

00:24:48.089 --> 00:24:52.289
classification. Even that's a mouthful. So kingdom,

00:24:52.490 --> 00:24:55.170
animalia. So that's like animals. I got that

00:24:55.170 --> 00:25:01.089
one. Phyla, chordata. Class Reptile, order Petrosauria,

00:25:01.170 --> 00:25:10.069
sub -order Petrodactyla, family Anagrida, sub

00:25:10.069 --> 00:25:13.490
-family Anagrina, and then the genus, which is

00:25:13.490 --> 00:25:19.210
the species name, Halischia petersini. I butchered

00:25:19.210 --> 00:25:23.359
it, I'm sorry. That's all good. So let's just

00:25:23.359 --> 00:25:27.119
take a shortcut. So we already know this animal

00:25:27.119 --> 00:25:30.359
has bones. Or, like, we already know it has bones.

00:25:30.480 --> 00:25:33.319
So that rules out plants. They don't have bones.

00:25:33.420 --> 00:25:36.579
And it rules out, like, fungi and bacteria. So,

00:25:36.579 --> 00:25:41.660
yeah. Phylum Chordata, it's something that has

00:25:41.660 --> 00:25:45.380
a backbone, essentially. So with the specimen,

00:25:45.440 --> 00:25:48.640
we had some vertebrae. And the vertebrae, one

00:25:48.640 --> 00:25:50.619
of the main jobs of the vertebrae is supposed

00:25:50.619 --> 00:25:53.640
to, like, give the body, like, some structure

00:25:53.640 --> 00:25:59.059
and stuff. But also that neural canal, that hole

00:25:59.059 --> 00:26:02.339
through the vertebrae, that protects the spinal

00:26:02.339 --> 00:26:04.640
cord. Because if you take a knock to your spinal

00:26:04.640 --> 00:26:08.400
cord, then your nervous system is basically not

00:26:08.400 --> 00:26:11.599
going to be able to do its job very well. And

00:26:11.599 --> 00:26:14.799
then, yeah, this is technically a special type

00:26:14.799 --> 00:26:19.240
of reptile. So as like a bit of a shortcut, if

00:26:19.240 --> 00:26:22.859
you know that the rocks are Cretaceous in age,

00:26:23.099 --> 00:26:27.819
the Mesozoic period, and the Mesozoic can then

00:26:27.819 --> 00:26:31.279
be broken down into Triassic, Jurassic, little

00:26:31.279 --> 00:26:33.420
obscure thing, you might've heard of it, and

00:26:33.420 --> 00:26:38.539
Cretaceous. So age of reptiles, it doesn't, well.

00:26:38.990 --> 00:26:40.829
At this time, there are mammals around. They're

00:26:40.829 --> 00:26:43.089
very small. Based on size alone, you can probably

00:26:43.089 --> 00:26:45.829
rule out that it's probably not a mammal. And

00:26:45.829 --> 00:26:51.089
yeah, it has these super elongate wing bones.

00:26:51.890 --> 00:26:56.529
So it's a type of pterosaur. So that is where

00:26:56.529 --> 00:27:00.890
the order Pterosauria comes in. And then pterosaurs

00:27:00.890 --> 00:27:04.730
can be split into two major groups. You have

00:27:04.730 --> 00:27:09.650
pterodactyloids and you have... Not pterodactyloids.

00:27:10.309 --> 00:27:14.230
So pterodactyloids are sometimes called short

00:27:14.230 --> 00:27:16.750
-tailed pterosaurs. And if you have something

00:27:16.750 --> 00:27:20.089
from the Cretaceous period, chances are it's

00:27:20.089 --> 00:27:22.730
probably a pterodactyloid. So again, just kind

00:27:22.730 --> 00:27:27.009
of process of elimination, Occam's razor, the

00:27:27.009 --> 00:27:30.589
most likely thing is probably what it's going

00:27:30.589 --> 00:27:34.390
to be. And then we've got our family and Hank

00:27:34.390 --> 00:27:38.759
Weraday. That's how I pronounce it. It is based

00:27:38.759 --> 00:27:43.000
on, like, the first Anhanguera was named from

00:27:43.000 --> 00:27:46.900
Brazil. And when I went to Brazil, I'm pretty

00:27:46.900 --> 00:27:48.519
sure I pronounced that word around some colleagues

00:27:48.519 --> 00:27:53.019
and they didn't correct me. Unlike the family

00:27:53.019 --> 00:27:56.339
name that has an X in it, which in Portuguese,

00:27:56.599 --> 00:27:58.839
in Brazilian Portuguese, is pronounced like a

00:27:58.839 --> 00:28:03.380
sh. So the word for cup in Brazilian Portuguese

00:28:03.380 --> 00:28:08.619
is xícara. Not Isikara, if I was pronouncing

00:28:08.619 --> 00:28:10.579
it with my really bogan Australian Queensland

00:28:10.579 --> 00:28:15.279
accent. But yeah, so my supervisor and I were

00:28:15.279 --> 00:28:17.579
saying the word Tupuksuara, but it should be

00:28:17.579 --> 00:28:22.039
pronounced Tupushuara. So yeah, trying to pay

00:28:22.039 --> 00:28:24.779
attention to like who named it and how they pronounce

00:28:24.779 --> 00:28:28.420
things is super helpful. But Anghanguera basically

00:28:28.420 --> 00:28:32.220
means old devil, which is a sick name. And a

00:28:32.220 --> 00:28:36.640
lot of members of the family Anhangweride have

00:28:36.640 --> 00:28:41.700
what's called a crest on the end of their snout.

00:28:42.579 --> 00:28:47.279
So I've tried to explain what this is before

00:28:47.279 --> 00:28:51.000
in only audio formats, and it's always a little

00:28:51.000 --> 00:28:55.119
bit tricky. But it's kind of, imagine like a

00:28:55.119 --> 00:29:00.500
spoon bill, but turn that on 90 degrees. It's

00:29:00.500 --> 00:29:02.480
kind of like this weird sort of diamond profile

00:29:02.480 --> 00:29:06.440
at the end of the snout. And if it's flying at

00:29:06.440 --> 00:29:09.180
you straight on, it's very, very thin. It's only

00:29:09.180 --> 00:29:14.200
one or two millimeters thick. So we had enough

00:29:14.200 --> 00:29:17.700
of the skull of this new pterosaur from Queensland

00:29:17.700 --> 00:29:21.180
to say, oh, it has a premaxillary crest. It's

00:29:21.180 --> 00:29:25.140
probably a member of this family, Anhangueridae.

00:29:25.740 --> 00:29:28.640
um other people might be more familiar with the

00:29:28.640 --> 00:29:33.420
family name ornithoceridae um especially if you

00:29:33.420 --> 00:29:37.440
watched uh walking with dinosaurs for example

00:29:37.440 --> 00:29:40.420
some people think that they're the same thing

00:29:40.420 --> 00:29:43.940
some people maintain that they're different let's

00:29:43.940 --> 00:29:46.579
not get into it if anyone really wants to know

00:29:46.579 --> 00:29:50.000
they can message me about it but i think i think

00:29:50.000 --> 00:29:52.640
that's like enough taxonomy and i realize like

00:29:52.640 --> 00:29:59.960
it's It's super complicated, but as people who

00:29:59.960 --> 00:30:02.339
work in science, generally speaking, it does

00:30:02.339 --> 00:30:05.940
help to group things together by similar uniting

00:30:05.940 --> 00:30:10.259
features. You might be working on rocks and just

00:30:10.259 --> 00:30:12.700
classifying different igneous rocks. You might

00:30:12.700 --> 00:30:16.700
be looking at microbes under a microscope and

00:30:16.700 --> 00:30:20.920
having features that you use to classify things.

00:30:21.630 --> 00:30:24.349
is something that you see across the board. I

00:30:24.349 --> 00:30:26.509
just think that sometimes paleontologists...

00:30:26.509 --> 00:30:32.730
I wouldn't say take it too far, but anyway. You're

00:30:32.730 --> 00:30:34.769
basically describing lumpers and splitters right

00:30:34.769 --> 00:30:39.630
there. Yes, oh my gosh, yes. So if you've never

00:30:39.630 --> 00:30:41.750
heard that term before... Really common thing

00:30:41.750 --> 00:30:46.349
in geology. Yeah, a splitter is like... A splitter

00:30:46.349 --> 00:30:48.390
kind of has the mindset of like, oh, this is

00:30:48.390 --> 00:30:50.690
new and nothing like this has ever been seen

00:30:50.690 --> 00:30:53.289
before. Whereas a lump, like it's two extremes,

00:30:53.410 --> 00:30:57.630
right? But a lump reminds me like, oh, like everything

00:30:57.630 --> 00:31:00.890
that looks like this is all this one species,

00:31:01.009 --> 00:31:04.630
for example, in paleontology. There are pros

00:31:04.630 --> 00:31:06.990
and cons to both approaches because of course,

00:31:07.109 --> 00:31:09.529
like even if you just look around, if you're

00:31:09.529 --> 00:31:11.450
in a room of people right now and you look around,

00:31:11.750 --> 00:31:15.839
you will see individual variation. And that's,

00:31:15.839 --> 00:31:18.799
you know, reflected through like different genetics,

00:31:18.880 --> 00:31:22.099
like different life stages, differences between

00:31:22.099 --> 00:31:26.480
sexes, like all of these things as well, which

00:31:26.480 --> 00:31:28.440
can be really difficult to pass out when all

00:31:28.440 --> 00:31:31.579
you have are bones. And not all of the bones

00:31:31.579 --> 00:31:39.160
either. Yeah. My next question is kind of following

00:31:39.160 --> 00:31:41.920
along the same tract and perhaps maybe should

00:31:41.920 --> 00:31:43.599
have come first, but I kept coming across because

00:31:43.599 --> 00:31:46.720
I actually read the papers that I do this. Sometimes

00:31:46.720 --> 00:31:50.140
I don't understand them. I felt pretty confident

00:31:50.140 --> 00:31:52.859
in some of the non -super technical stuff about

00:31:52.859 --> 00:31:55.099
the bones, but one thing that kept coming up

00:31:55.099 --> 00:31:59.420
was a way to refer to specific fossil specimens

00:31:59.420 --> 00:32:01.900
in the... paper i guess with letters and numbers

00:32:01.900 --> 00:32:04.700
almost like a code i'm not quite sure i know

00:32:04.700 --> 00:32:07.140
how to crack it but if i were to take a guess

00:32:07.140 --> 00:32:11.019
each species discovered is assigned a standard

00:32:11.019 --> 00:32:14.579
to represent that species like a standard for

00:32:14.579 --> 00:32:19.579
dog breeds at a show and this number uh it gets

00:32:19.579 --> 00:32:23.319
to be assigned as that species standard is that

00:32:23.319 --> 00:32:25.400
what it is or am i stretching it too much that

00:32:25.400 --> 00:32:28.480
is that no no like you're very very close um

00:32:28.480 --> 00:32:34.970
okay so Let's use the example of Holiskia and

00:32:34.970 --> 00:32:41.390
the specimen number is KKF1426. So that is a

00:32:41.390 --> 00:32:46.470
museum catalogue number. So the idea is that...

00:32:47.309 --> 00:32:50.069
You might have, there are different institutions,

00:32:50.250 --> 00:32:52.369
say, for example, another one that I know off

00:32:52.369 --> 00:32:54.910
the top of my head is AAOD, which is Australian

00:32:54.910 --> 00:32:58.670
Age of Dinosaurs. So when you see that at the

00:32:58.670 --> 00:33:02.109
start of a number, you know which museum, you

00:33:02.109 --> 00:33:05.250
know, hopefully, what the geographic location

00:33:05.250 --> 00:33:08.109
of that specimen is, if you then want to do a

00:33:08.109 --> 00:33:11.430
research visit to see it. Museums have to be

00:33:11.430 --> 00:33:14.890
audited as well. They need to prove for, I think,

00:33:14.890 --> 00:33:17.519
insurance purposes. to the government as well,

00:33:17.660 --> 00:33:19.859
that they have the specimens that they say they

00:33:19.859 --> 00:33:23.900
have. And ideally with museum catalog numbers,

00:33:23.980 --> 00:33:27.920
each number is unique. There are no double ups

00:33:27.920 --> 00:33:32.920
as well. So, and how this kind of works in terms

00:33:32.920 --> 00:33:37.359
of my research is that say, for example, someone

00:33:37.359 --> 00:33:41.220
later this year, and I don't think this is going

00:33:41.220 --> 00:33:44.710
to happen. Hopefully not. Say, in our example,

00:33:44.829 --> 00:33:47.730
someone says, Holiskia isn't a valid species.

00:33:48.509 --> 00:33:52.410
The characters that you've used to identify it

00:33:52.410 --> 00:33:54.869
and distinguish it from other members of its

00:33:54.869 --> 00:33:58.950
family, you know, if they find a specimen and

00:33:58.950 --> 00:34:01.549
it's like, oh, actually, you know, these three

00:34:01.549 --> 00:34:04.130
features are also found in four other species,

00:34:04.430 --> 00:34:09.510
then Holiskia isn't a valid species anymore.

00:34:10.699 --> 00:34:16.219
But KKF 1426 still exists. It will always exist.

00:34:16.639 --> 00:34:22.519
So if the species name is sort of like the wine

00:34:22.519 --> 00:34:25.940
label, then the museum number is kind of like

00:34:25.940 --> 00:34:28.059
the bottle, like the physical thing that exists.

00:34:28.880 --> 00:34:31.699
And in that instance, someone might say, okay,

00:34:31.739 --> 00:34:37.400
KKF 1426. So that's the holotype specimen of

00:34:37.400 --> 00:34:39.519
Heliskia. That's kind of how that is working

00:34:39.519 --> 00:34:43.039
right now. But if we circle back to our example,

00:34:43.119 --> 00:34:46.219
and someone tries to nuke Heliskia and tell me

00:34:46.219 --> 00:34:49.559
that my work is garbage, which does happen in

00:34:49.559 --> 00:34:52.460
science, and science is self -correcting. In

00:34:52.460 --> 00:34:55.320
that example, they might say Heliskia is a junior

00:34:55.320 --> 00:35:00.179
synonym of another species, and KKF 1426 should

00:35:00.179 --> 00:35:05.139
be a referred specimen of a species that was

00:35:05.139 --> 00:35:07.460
named maybe five or ten years ago, something

00:35:07.460 --> 00:35:13.059
like that. yeah it also does get tricky when

00:35:13.059 --> 00:35:16.079
and it doesn't often happen but specimens can

00:35:16.079 --> 00:35:19.840
get moved to different museums and then those

00:35:19.840 --> 00:35:22.900
numbers can change um but it doesn't happen that

00:35:22.900 --> 00:35:27.980
often so it's kind of sometimes if a fossil has

00:35:27.980 --> 00:35:30.260
a bit of like a complicated or a contentious

00:35:30.260 --> 00:35:35.099
history uh for me sometimes in my like library

00:35:35.099 --> 00:35:37.579
of papers it's a lot easier sometimes to just

00:35:37.579 --> 00:35:40.340
put in the specimen number and work out who said

00:35:40.340 --> 00:35:45.739
what about it rather than trying to follow what

00:35:45.739 --> 00:35:47.500
different names it's been given. And also some

00:35:47.500 --> 00:35:50.840
people will come up with nicknames. Say, for

00:35:50.840 --> 00:35:52.780
example, they might call something the Richmond

00:35:52.780 --> 00:35:55.460
polycotyled or polycotyled, however you want

00:35:55.460 --> 00:35:58.760
to pronounce it. That might only be used in one

00:35:58.760 --> 00:36:02.500
paper. So then to sort of like track it is, yeah,

00:36:02.539 --> 00:36:06.900
it's super messy. But essentially, museum collection

00:36:06.900 --> 00:36:08.929
managers are probably... thinking that i've made

00:36:08.929 --> 00:36:12.389
a hash of this but those unique numbers should

00:36:12.389 --> 00:36:15.869
mean that in a well -organized collection if

00:36:15.869 --> 00:36:18.250
someone says i would like to study this specimen

00:36:18.250 --> 00:36:20.409
you know exactly where it is in the shelf and

00:36:20.409 --> 00:36:23.030
then you can get it ready for them to have a

00:36:23.030 --> 00:36:26.030
look at so they can do their science i hope that

00:36:26.030 --> 00:36:28.329
makes sense so one of the things that you said

00:36:28.329 --> 00:36:32.949
right there was hollow species like the one yeah

00:36:32.949 --> 00:36:36.639
holotype the specimen that is the best rep Right,

00:36:36.780 --> 00:36:40.059
so I guess where I was coming from, my understanding

00:36:40.059 --> 00:36:43.480
was that that part, you could end up changing

00:36:43.480 --> 00:36:48.219
the fossil number. A newer fossil that's more

00:36:48.219 --> 00:36:52.639
complete can become the hollow type, right? Normally,

00:36:54.980 --> 00:36:59.139
if there's a new holotype, which is called a

00:36:59.139 --> 00:37:03.079
neotype, normally what's happened is the original

00:37:03.079 --> 00:37:07.590
fossil got destroyed. Say, for example, during

00:37:07.590 --> 00:37:11.190
World War II, when those fossils were bombed,

00:37:11.210 --> 00:37:14.809
then they needed to define a neotype, a new holotype.

00:37:15.690 --> 00:37:19.909
Even if you have a holotype and it's 10 % complete...

00:37:19.909 --> 00:37:21.250
We're back to Spinosaurus, by the way, for those

00:37:21.250 --> 00:37:27.389
that are following. Yeah. Take a shot. No. I

00:37:27.389 --> 00:37:30.070
mean, yeah, I haven't talked about Jurassic Park

00:37:30.070 --> 00:37:32.349
yet, but all these... All roads tend to lead

00:37:32.349 --> 00:37:34.670
back to Jurassic Park and Spinosaurus in some

00:37:34.670 --> 00:37:40.670
ways. So, yeah. Oh, gosh, what was I saying?

00:37:40.929 --> 00:37:44.769
Just distracted now. Oh, even if you have a holotype

00:37:44.769 --> 00:37:47.349
that's 10 % complete, and then if you have a

00:37:47.349 --> 00:37:50.869
100 % complete specimen that's found later, normally

00:37:50.869 --> 00:37:54.070
what happens is the holotype still remains the

00:37:54.070 --> 00:37:57.170
holotype by definition. It just kind of might

00:37:57.170 --> 00:37:59.210
get pushed to the side in the literature and

00:37:59.210 --> 00:38:02.030
people will focus on. That really nice, more

00:38:02.030 --> 00:38:04.929
complete, more anatomically informative, like

00:38:04.929 --> 00:38:08.469
full of bones specimen. Interesting. So that

00:38:08.469 --> 00:38:11.329
is different from other fields of geology. Like,

00:38:11.329 --> 00:38:15.070
for instance, if you found a better set of strata

00:38:15.070 --> 00:38:17.570
that better shows, let's say, the K -T boundary

00:38:17.570 --> 00:38:20.030
where everything got nuked due to the asteroid,

00:38:20.269 --> 00:38:25.460
you would actually change the best. what the

00:38:25.460 --> 00:38:27.519
standard is for the K -T boundary. You would

00:38:27.519 --> 00:38:32.519
actually change it to the new spot. So I'm surprised

00:38:32.519 --> 00:38:34.639
it doesn't change to the individual fossils.

00:38:35.659 --> 00:38:41.500
Yeah. If I had to guess, I'd say that paleontology

00:38:41.500 --> 00:38:44.320
has a few hangovers of, this is the way it's

00:38:44.320 --> 00:38:48.840
always been. That kind of mentality. So things

00:38:48.840 --> 00:38:52.460
might change in the future. It would be handier

00:38:52.460 --> 00:38:55.389
if it was, you know, Just the holotype is the

00:38:55.389 --> 00:39:00.769
best representation of X, whatever it is. But

00:39:00.769 --> 00:39:03.130
sadly, that's not the rules that we operate by.

00:39:04.329 --> 00:39:07.090
I learned so much from this. I'm so glad I keep

00:39:07.090 --> 00:39:10.130
doing this. The next section of the paper I want

00:39:10.130 --> 00:39:12.429
to get into seems to hit at a common problem,

00:39:12.670 --> 00:39:14.789
piecing together individuals and species. We've

00:39:14.789 --> 00:39:16.650
already alluded to it here that you could end

00:39:16.650 --> 00:39:20.449
up renaming a species based on other data. And

00:39:20.449 --> 00:39:22.650
I guess my context comes from the last time.

00:39:23.070 --> 00:39:27.269
the podcast looked at Tyrannosaurs, where in

00:39:27.269 --> 00:39:30.670
my research, separate species just kind of disappeared

00:39:30.670 --> 00:39:32.889
from the literature because they were lumped

00:39:32.889 --> 00:39:35.650
in with other species. And Tyrannosaurs, they're

00:39:35.650 --> 00:39:37.989
a bit more complicated because they grow so much.

00:39:38.170 --> 00:39:40.110
And so the smaller ones were being labeled as

00:39:40.110 --> 00:39:41.710
their own species, even though they were just

00:39:41.710 --> 00:39:46.389
not adults. But with not a whole lot of bones

00:39:46.389 --> 00:39:50.969
and lack of preservation, I assume there's similar

00:39:50.969 --> 00:39:54.570
issues here, right? Yeah, so there definitely

00:39:54.570 --> 00:39:58.530
can be. With the groups that I study, it's more

00:39:58.530 --> 00:40:03.110
a case of whether the variation, like the differences

00:40:03.110 --> 00:40:08.550
in the bones are because of maybe like male -female

00:40:08.550 --> 00:40:12.829
variation. And I think it might also just come

00:40:12.829 --> 00:40:16.809
from looking at pterosaurs through a bird lens

00:40:16.809 --> 00:40:21.500
and knowing that in some bird species, They don't

00:40:21.500 --> 00:40:24.480
tend to have big differences in the body size,

00:40:24.659 --> 00:40:27.460
but their ornamentation, like their feathers,

00:40:27.599 --> 00:40:30.340
their coloration, can be wildly different. Think

00:40:30.340 --> 00:40:32.559
of a peacock and a peahen, for example. That's

00:40:32.559 --> 00:40:38.760
one of the extremes. So in Anghanguarian pterosaurs,

00:40:39.019 --> 00:40:43.679
there has been some debate about whether species

00:40:43.679 --> 00:40:49.150
that lack a crest entirely are... distinct that's

00:40:49.150 --> 00:40:53.570
that's kind of the assumption that we have but

00:40:53.570 --> 00:40:59.050
in terms of like how big the crest is early days

00:40:59.050 --> 00:41:01.469
there's a lot of emphasis put on like the angle

00:41:01.469 --> 00:41:03.929
the shape like how big it is does it reach like

00:41:03.929 --> 00:41:07.750
the end of the snout um these days not so much

00:41:07.750 --> 00:41:12.730
but i will also add the caveat that when we do

00:41:12.730 --> 00:41:16.090
what's called a phylogenetic analysis we are

00:41:16.090 --> 00:41:19.690
still sort of placing emphasis on those features.

00:41:20.230 --> 00:41:23.510
But to sort of try and like tie this in a bow,

00:41:23.690 --> 00:41:28.250
it's important to note that some of the Anhanguarian

00:41:28.250 --> 00:41:31.150
pterosaurs with the biggest wingspans, they don't

00:41:31.150 --> 00:41:35.030
always have the biggest crests. So there's, yeah,

00:41:35.130 --> 00:41:37.889
been like a little bit of that going on. Unfortunately,

00:41:38.590 --> 00:41:41.409
oh, well, for better or for worse, this is a

00:41:41.409 --> 00:41:45.900
group where we don't have basically... any juvenile

00:41:45.900 --> 00:41:52.260
or very few sub -adult specimens. Which is crazy

00:41:52.260 --> 00:41:54.860
because there have been so many fossils found

00:41:54.860 --> 00:41:59.780
from Brazil. The Araripe Basin is a fossil Lagerstaden,

00:41:59.980 --> 00:42:03.179
which is just a fancy German word to say that

00:42:03.179 --> 00:42:05.500
they have a crazy amount of fossils that come

00:42:05.500 --> 00:42:10.110
out of there. And there is quite a lot. about

00:42:10.110 --> 00:42:12.909
fossils that have been illegally smuggled out

00:42:12.909 --> 00:42:17.389
of Brazil, but out of all of the specimens that

00:42:17.389 --> 00:42:20.110
are known in museum collections and even the

00:42:20.110 --> 00:42:25.130
ones that are in private collections, as far

00:42:25.130 --> 00:42:27.230
as I know in the conversations I've had with

00:42:27.230 --> 00:42:31.070
colleagues, we still don't have evidence of these

00:42:31.070 --> 00:42:35.530
young animals. So to me, that might signal that

00:42:37.049 --> 00:42:40.510
the colonies, the rookeries, like where the juveniles

00:42:40.510 --> 00:42:44.030
are hanging out are, you know, in a different

00:42:44.030 --> 00:42:46.789
space to where these adults are hunting in these

00:42:46.789 --> 00:42:50.510
lagoon and in my case, the Aramanga Sea, you

00:42:50.510 --> 00:42:54.389
know, these inland oceans, they're not able to

00:42:54.389 --> 00:42:56.809
get out there and hunt for those reasons. So

00:42:56.809 --> 00:42:58.630
they're not being fossilized with the adults.

00:42:59.130 --> 00:43:02.929
So it can, yeah, definitely be an issue as well.

00:43:03.050 --> 00:43:05.010
And that's something that I need to keep in mind.

00:43:05.030 --> 00:43:07.869
It's something that I hope that I always sort

00:43:07.869 --> 00:43:09.969
of have in the back of my mind when I'm looking

00:43:09.969 --> 00:43:13.210
at a fossil, trying to be aware of my own ego

00:43:13.210 --> 00:43:17.090
as well, because I would hate and be super embarrassed

00:43:17.090 --> 00:43:20.789
by the fact that if I named a new species and

00:43:20.789 --> 00:43:23.510
then someone else later said, oh, actually, it's

00:43:23.510 --> 00:43:25.750
the same as another species you've already named

00:43:25.750 --> 00:43:29.289
before. So when I was working on Heliskia, even

00:43:29.289 --> 00:43:31.469
though I knew it was six million years older

00:43:31.469 --> 00:43:33.869
than Ferro Draco, it was in a different fossil

00:43:33.869 --> 00:43:37.000
environment. I really had to try and like keep

00:43:37.000 --> 00:43:39.900
myself honest and say, okay, some species do

00:43:39.900 --> 00:43:43.380
last for millions of years. Like really prove

00:43:43.380 --> 00:43:46.880
to yourself and back yourself and know, or like,

00:43:46.940 --> 00:43:50.300
you know, have a long list of these are the reasons

00:43:50.300 --> 00:43:52.599
why it's a new species, not just the underlying

00:43:52.599 --> 00:43:54.780
assumption that, oh, it's 6 million years older.

00:43:54.840 --> 00:43:56.900
Of course, it's going to be a new species. No,

00:43:56.980 --> 00:44:00.260
like you need to look at the bones. If you have,

00:44:00.260 --> 00:44:02.719
you know, the same species here on earth and

00:44:02.719 --> 00:44:06.179
on the moon. you know, it doesn't matter the

00:44:06.179 --> 00:44:10.579
separation of time or distance. Again, you just

00:44:10.579 --> 00:44:15.059
need to really focus on it. And yeah, just having

00:44:15.059 --> 00:44:18.199
great collaborators that keep me honest as well,

00:44:18.280 --> 00:44:21.320
that I can have these conversations with also

00:44:21.320 --> 00:44:23.989
helps make the science really rigorous. Next,

00:44:24.010 --> 00:44:26.690
we get to where I was going to bring up the Spinosaurus

00:44:26.690 --> 00:44:29.130
controversy in a different way. Because I guess

00:44:29.130 --> 00:44:31.750
just like the T -Rexes, size is something of

00:44:31.750 --> 00:44:34.010
a focus, especially when it comes to the prehistoric

00:44:34.010 --> 00:44:37.010
stuff, because it does matter, at least for journalism.

00:44:37.650 --> 00:44:41.570
It seemed to me, and I'm a complete outsider,

00:44:41.889 --> 00:44:46.090
that the paper hinted at wingspan estimates have

00:44:46.090 --> 00:44:49.489
been contentious with different species. Is that

00:44:49.489 --> 00:44:53.900
right? Yeah, so of the five species, of pterosaur

00:44:53.900 --> 00:44:57.099
we have in Australia. Two are known from partial

00:44:57.099 --> 00:44:59.519
skeletons that preserve parts of their wings,

00:44:59.760 --> 00:45:05.019
but not every single bone in their wing is represented.

00:45:05.619 --> 00:45:07.659
And then the other three, they're just known

00:45:07.659 --> 00:45:13.760
from skulls. So I have a little bit of issue

00:45:13.760 --> 00:45:16.519
with people trying to estimate a wingspan just

00:45:16.519 --> 00:45:21.400
based on a skull, because even if you know what

00:45:21.400 --> 00:45:24.059
family it belongs to, depending on what you compare

00:45:24.059 --> 00:45:26.400
it with, you might end up with something that's,

00:45:26.400 --> 00:45:28.119
you know, three meters or it could get blown

00:45:28.119 --> 00:45:30.920
up to like eight or nine meters. I don't have

00:45:30.920 --> 00:45:33.480
the exact conversions in feet, but I think that'd

00:45:33.480 --> 00:45:36.639
be, you know, as big a difference as like 10

00:45:36.639 --> 00:45:38.559
feet to 20 feet. Like that's a huge difference,

00:45:38.679 --> 00:45:43.199
right? So yeah, I just think it's bonkers as

00:45:43.199 --> 00:45:45.159
well. Like if I looked at someone's, if I knew

00:45:45.159 --> 00:45:46.579
someone's hat size, I wouldn't know what their

00:45:46.579 --> 00:45:49.400
shoe size was because there is that level of

00:45:49.400 --> 00:45:54.420
variation and... Yeah, it's for me, I just try

00:45:54.420 --> 00:45:58.500
and be conservative. Say, for example, with one

00:45:58.500 --> 00:46:01.260
of the first pterosaur species that was named,

00:46:01.440 --> 00:46:03.780
you know, we only have the middle section of

00:46:03.780 --> 00:46:06.559
the skull. It could be its wingspan is probably

00:46:06.559 --> 00:46:09.340
somewhere between four to six meters. We don't

00:46:09.340 --> 00:46:11.300
know at this stage. Hopefully we find a more

00:46:11.300 --> 00:46:13.260
complete specimen and we can fine tune that.

00:46:13.440 --> 00:46:17.519
But yeah, I'm pretty skeptical and very aware

00:46:17.519 --> 00:46:19.940
that, yes, the biggest, the smallest, the fastest.

00:46:20.780 --> 00:46:24.440
there's a lot of emphasis that's put on those

00:46:24.440 --> 00:46:28.619
things and those hard numbers as well. And don't

00:46:28.619 --> 00:46:31.139
worry, I work in meters too. It's only my American

00:46:31.139 --> 00:46:33.260
listeners that are still in feet. I guess the

00:46:33.260 --> 00:46:36.360
British are too, aren't they? No, I think the

00:46:36.360 --> 00:46:39.039
British are going with meters and stuff. Yeah,

00:46:39.079 --> 00:46:43.519
no, it's all good. I am in the loose habit of

00:46:43.519 --> 00:46:47.679
trying to do the conversions and stuff. With

00:46:47.679 --> 00:46:50.260
my podcast, even though I'm based in Australia,

00:46:50.380 --> 00:46:52.219
I think most of my listenership was based in

00:46:52.219 --> 00:46:56.320
the US, which was wild to me when I first started.

00:46:56.619 --> 00:46:59.059
But yeah, love having that in there for accessibility.

00:47:00.380 --> 00:47:03.039
Maybe one day you will see that meters is truly

00:47:03.039 --> 00:47:06.460
superior, but if you work in feet, I know you're

00:47:06.460 --> 00:47:08.440
not going to Google it, so I might as well slap

00:47:08.440 --> 00:47:12.130
it together in my notes. Yeah, although... Anyone

00:47:12.130 --> 00:47:14.550
listening, you can get pretty close to three

00:47:14.550 --> 00:47:16.409
feet per meter. As long as you're not having

00:47:16.409 --> 00:47:18.230
a ton of meters, it's going to work out just

00:47:18.230 --> 00:47:20.769
fine. Yard and meter is pretty close. But at

00:47:20.769 --> 00:47:24.630
any rate, we kind of did a little bit of how

00:47:24.630 --> 00:47:26.530
they lived because you kind of went over the

00:47:26.530 --> 00:47:29.489
fact that we don't have young ones in the fossil

00:47:29.489 --> 00:47:32.889
record. So it is completely conjecture, I guess.

00:47:32.969 --> 00:47:37.590
The young ones, seaside cliffs, trees, we have

00:47:37.590 --> 00:47:41.380
no hard evidence then. Yeah, so there's a few

00:47:41.380 --> 00:47:45.980
sites where they have eggs and nest sites. So

00:47:45.980 --> 00:47:49.980
I think for, and again, it's like kind of difficult

00:47:49.980 --> 00:47:52.500
to know because if you have like a storm deposit

00:47:52.500 --> 00:47:54.739
and you have a bunch of eggs that have been washed

00:47:54.739 --> 00:47:58.639
in, you can't assume that they were all laid

00:47:58.639 --> 00:48:02.400
by the same individual. And you can't really

00:48:02.400 --> 00:48:06.800
assume like what the clutch size was. It seems

00:48:06.800 --> 00:48:10.860
that for the pterosaurs that we know, they have

00:48:10.860 --> 00:48:13.960
multiple eggs rather than just one egg. But if

00:48:13.960 --> 00:48:15.719
we think about birds as well, like there's a

00:48:15.719 --> 00:48:19.159
huge amount of like strategy and diversity. Like

00:48:19.159 --> 00:48:21.320
some of the really large species, they'll have

00:48:21.320 --> 00:48:25.239
maybe one or two eggs. One is sort of an insurance

00:48:25.239 --> 00:48:29.019
policy for the other egg. But when that hatches,

00:48:29.039 --> 00:48:31.679
you know, the parents put all of their effort

00:48:31.679 --> 00:48:34.440
and time into trying to raise that one chick.

00:48:35.159 --> 00:48:37.860
Think of, say, emperor penguins, for example.

00:48:37.980 --> 00:48:40.519
They have a really challenging environment. Food

00:48:40.519 --> 00:48:43.840
sources are limited. So having a clutch size

00:48:43.840 --> 00:48:47.179
of eight or so chicks, they're probably not all

00:48:47.179 --> 00:48:48.920
going... Well, none of them will probably survive

00:48:48.920 --> 00:48:53.780
in that instance. So there's that. But for the

00:48:53.780 --> 00:49:00.030
eggs that have been found of pterosaurs... I'm

00:49:00.030 --> 00:49:01.630
so glad I get to talk about this because I was

00:49:01.630 --> 00:49:03.610
going to include it in my thesis and then I ended

00:49:03.610 --> 00:49:06.429
up cutting it because it wasn't relevant. But

00:49:06.429 --> 00:49:09.650
it seems that the eggshells for a lot of pterosaur

00:49:09.650 --> 00:49:14.409
eggs are not super hard shelled. So they're a

00:49:14.409 --> 00:49:17.210
little bit different to birds. So there's been

00:49:17.210 --> 00:49:20.929
a little bit of conjecture about incubating those

00:49:20.929 --> 00:49:26.110
eggs in warm sand, for example. And sort of that

00:49:26.110 --> 00:49:29.349
side, like sort of that. strategy for example

00:49:29.349 --> 00:49:34.610
but yeah if pterosaurs are in trees as well then

00:49:34.610 --> 00:49:38.630
having your eggs off the ground away from quite

00:49:38.630 --> 00:49:42.010
a lot of predators would also be a great strategy

00:49:42.010 --> 00:49:46.730
so there's yeah there's a little bit of conjecture

00:49:46.730 --> 00:49:51.570
about uh the chemical composition of the eggshells

00:49:51.570 --> 00:49:57.130
technically my boss's boss is a geochemist I

00:49:57.130 --> 00:49:59.610
have not really like picked up anything like

00:49:59.610 --> 00:50:03.309
that and haven't really gone down that line of

00:50:03.309 --> 00:50:07.449
analysis in my own research, but that seems to

00:50:07.449 --> 00:50:11.170
be what we have at the moment. But I think there's

00:50:11.170 --> 00:50:17.610
only three or so species where we have eggs and

00:50:17.610 --> 00:50:22.829
embryos and eggs represented out of the 200 plus.

00:50:23.849 --> 00:50:28.070
pterosaur species that we know of so again there's

00:50:28.070 --> 00:50:31.190
probably like a wide range of behaviors and habits

00:50:31.190 --> 00:50:35.010
going on and yeah in terms of you know parental

00:50:35.010 --> 00:50:38.469
care strategies and stuff um this is something

00:50:38.469 --> 00:50:41.510
that I did touch on in my thesis sort of building

00:50:41.510 --> 00:50:44.849
on work that was done by Darren Nash along with

00:50:44.849 --> 00:50:48.309
um Liz Martin Silverstone and colleagues they

00:50:48.309 --> 00:50:53.460
talk about the fact that based on the wing bone

00:50:53.460 --> 00:50:57.119
ratios of some of the pterosaurs they looked

00:50:57.119 --> 00:50:59.219
at it seems that soon after hatching pterosaurs

00:50:59.219 --> 00:51:02.519
could fly which seems to suggest that there's

00:51:02.519 --> 00:51:04.900
not a lot of parental care going on that the

00:51:04.900 --> 00:51:08.300
young aren't dependent on the adults and they

00:51:08.300 --> 00:51:12.920
can relatively quickly get on with things and

00:51:12.920 --> 00:51:15.739
get their own food and things like that but again

00:51:15.739 --> 00:51:20.289
there's yeah I mean, with those really big giraffe

00:51:20.289 --> 00:51:23.389
-sized pterosaurs and stuff, well, are they doing

00:51:23.389 --> 00:51:25.789
the same thing? We don't have fossils to say

00:51:25.789 --> 00:51:30.389
whether that's the case. Yeah, all sorts of things

00:51:30.389 --> 00:51:33.369
to think about. The amazing thing about science,

00:51:33.489 --> 00:51:35.570
and definitely with paleontology, is the more

00:51:35.570 --> 00:51:37.469
you find out, just the more questions that you

00:51:37.469 --> 00:51:40.369
have. Yeah, because if that isn't happening,

00:51:40.429 --> 00:51:44.670
you're doing it wrong. Yeah. The idea is to try

00:51:44.670 --> 00:51:50.420
and keep yourself in a job. Hey, now, I think

00:51:50.420 --> 00:51:52.260
it's always a bit more about like just exploring

00:51:52.260 --> 00:51:55.159
the universe. And if life would be so boring

00:51:55.159 --> 00:51:56.900
if you just had all the answers. I mean, that's

00:51:56.900 --> 00:51:59.900
the that's the human condition, I think. Yeah.

00:52:00.019 --> 00:52:03.900
And paleontology is like time travel. Yeah, for

00:52:03.900 --> 00:52:06.820
sure. And before we move on to more of the present,

00:52:06.980 --> 00:52:09.239
is there anything we missed from the paper or

00:52:09.239 --> 00:52:11.940
in our discussion of the individual? I won't

00:52:11.940 --> 00:52:15.829
try to pronounce its name again. Uh, yeah. So

00:52:15.829 --> 00:52:19.190
with Holiskia, Peters and I, um, I mentioned

00:52:19.190 --> 00:52:21.750
before it had like those throat bones, like that

00:52:21.750 --> 00:52:25.190
thin piece of spaghetti, uh, of any pterosaur

00:52:25.190 --> 00:52:27.969
where we have like the complete lower jaw and

00:52:27.969 --> 00:52:31.230
the throat bones, Holiskia has like the biggest

00:52:31.230 --> 00:52:33.949
ratio. Like those throat bones are super long

00:52:33.949 --> 00:52:38.530
compared to the lower jaw. So, uh, when I commissioned

00:52:38.530 --> 00:52:41.969
Gabriel Aguero to do the paleo art for that,

00:52:42.090 --> 00:52:44.659
um, which was amazing. best like money i've ever

00:52:44.659 --> 00:52:47.820
spent uh you know we were sort of discussing

00:52:47.820 --> 00:52:49.679
like oh maybe like we'll give it a bit of a gula

00:52:49.679 --> 00:52:52.719
pouch which is speculative we don't have any

00:52:52.719 --> 00:52:56.659
soft tissue evidence with that fossil um but

00:52:56.659 --> 00:53:02.119
yeah it seems like it's got like a really really

00:53:02.119 --> 00:53:04.539
strong tongue to maybe i don't know slip down

00:53:04.539 --> 00:53:08.000
fish or cephalopods whatever it was hunting so

00:53:08.000 --> 00:53:11.599
yeah there's There's some of that going on. But

00:53:11.599 --> 00:53:13.900
then in terms of, like, the specific diet for

00:53:13.900 --> 00:53:18.420
this animal, quite a few pterosaurs and other

00:53:18.420 --> 00:53:22.500
creatures that lived in the Aramanga Basin, in

00:53:22.500 --> 00:53:25.400
this massive inland sea that covered part of

00:53:25.400 --> 00:53:27.920
Australia during the Cretaceous period, quite

00:53:27.920 --> 00:53:31.199
a lot of them have these lines or ridges on their

00:53:31.199 --> 00:53:33.480
teeth that go up and down from, like, the tip

00:53:33.480 --> 00:53:36.059
to the base. But Heliskia doesn't seem to have

00:53:36.059 --> 00:53:39.420
any of that. And I don't think that any of those

00:53:39.420 --> 00:53:41.159
ridges were present and they've eroded away.

00:53:41.219 --> 00:53:44.079
I think they're just genuinely not there. They're

00:53:44.079 --> 00:53:48.880
absent. So when I compare that with, say, like

00:53:48.880 --> 00:53:51.280
the teeth of Mathanga, which has these really

00:53:51.280 --> 00:53:55.139
chunky ridges, to me it's like, okay, well, the

00:53:55.139 --> 00:53:57.059
idea with the chunky ridges is kind of like it

00:53:57.059 --> 00:54:00.159
helps to grip food. So if you think of your fingertips

00:54:00.159 --> 00:54:02.880
when you're in water and you get like pruney

00:54:02.880 --> 00:54:08.500
fingers. the idea or not the idea what is happening

00:54:08.500 --> 00:54:11.659
is your body is doing that so that you can grip

00:54:11.659 --> 00:54:14.360
things better like those extra surfaces help

00:54:14.360 --> 00:54:17.340
you grab things better the same with ridges on

00:54:17.340 --> 00:54:21.360
teeth so the fact that heliskia doesn't have

00:54:21.360 --> 00:54:26.079
them there yeah just it it's not important or

00:54:26.079 --> 00:54:29.980
there's something else going on um yeah there's

00:54:29.980 --> 00:54:33.320
more work that i'd love to do on it but I have

00:54:33.320 --> 00:54:35.360
like a few other projects and stuff that are

00:54:35.360 --> 00:54:39.679
sort of like begging for my attention, including

00:54:39.679 --> 00:54:42.539
like museum and exhibition design to try and

00:54:42.539 --> 00:54:45.500
like showcase that specimen as best I can. But

00:54:45.500 --> 00:54:48.900
yeah, there's, if you want to read more about

00:54:48.900 --> 00:54:51.840
it, I wrote an article for something called The

00:54:51.840 --> 00:54:54.260
Conversation about what that fossil can tell

00:54:54.260 --> 00:54:57.380
us. So if reading scientific papers isn't so

00:54:57.380 --> 00:54:59.019
much your thing, that's also like a really great

00:54:59.019 --> 00:55:01.860
place to start. Yeah, send me the link. I'll

00:55:01.860 --> 00:55:03.360
make sure it gets included in the show notes.

00:55:03.440 --> 00:55:05.619
But you were just mentioning the same as the

00:55:05.619 --> 00:55:07.380
next question I was going to bring up, because

00:55:07.380 --> 00:55:10.320
introducing you, you spent a fair bit of time

00:55:10.320 --> 00:55:13.780
helping design, make, well, anyway, exhibits

00:55:13.780 --> 00:55:15.679
anyway, producing them in some way for museums.

00:55:16.679 --> 00:55:19.380
And I guess you're just telling me the plans

00:55:19.380 --> 00:55:22.079
that you are going to make the same treatment

00:55:22.079 --> 00:55:25.400
for this species or this discovery, or has it

00:55:25.400 --> 00:55:29.429
already happened? Oh, so it hasn't sort of, we're

00:55:29.429 --> 00:55:31.150
in the messy middle. We're in the interesting

00:55:31.150 --> 00:55:36.070
part. So in terms of some of the other exhibition

00:55:36.070 --> 00:55:38.289
designs that I've been involved with, I can't

00:55:38.289 --> 00:55:42.869
take a whole heap of credit. So one was with

00:55:42.869 --> 00:55:46.110
the Australian Age of Dinosaurs Museum of Natural

00:55:46.110 --> 00:55:49.250
History. And that was for the first species that

00:55:49.250 --> 00:55:54.389
I named in 2019. They have what's called their

00:55:54.389 --> 00:55:58.230
holotype room. So all of the fossil specimens

00:55:58.230 --> 00:56:01.070
that are new to science and they define their

00:56:01.070 --> 00:56:05.349
species, they normally keep in one spot, which

00:56:05.349 --> 00:56:09.389
is fine. But most of the things that are in that

00:56:09.389 --> 00:56:12.909
room, and you're sort of on a stage and you're

00:56:12.909 --> 00:56:15.710
looking down at these specimens, a lot of those

00:56:15.710 --> 00:56:18.550
bones are from these massive long -necked dinosaurs,

00:56:18.829 --> 00:56:21.309
these sauropods. Think of Littlefoot from Land

00:56:21.309 --> 00:56:23.909
Before Time. We're working on a different scale.

00:56:24.090 --> 00:56:27.250
Like, my boy is not as big as those other sauropods.

00:56:27.389 --> 00:56:30.050
So in terms of my input for that exhibition design,

00:56:30.449 --> 00:56:34.409
I basically said, I know we call it the holotype

00:56:34.409 --> 00:56:36.429
room, and I know this is a holotype, but can

00:56:36.429 --> 00:56:39.269
we please not have Fur Draco there? Can we have

00:56:39.269 --> 00:56:43.769
it in this specific museum display case so that

00:56:43.769 --> 00:56:47.429
people can see it? Because I worked as a tour

00:56:47.429 --> 00:56:50.840
guide at that museum for a while, and... I was

00:56:50.840 --> 00:56:53.139
already aware that for people who have low vision,

00:56:53.260 --> 00:56:58.960
having, you know, the biggest bone in Ferro Draco's

00:56:58.960 --> 00:57:02.559
body is about 30 centimeters as preserved. Having

00:57:02.559 --> 00:57:06.780
that be sort of, I don't know, four or five meters

00:57:06.780 --> 00:57:09.579
away for someone with low vision in a room that

00:57:09.579 --> 00:57:12.460
has sort of this like nice, but sort of atmospheric

00:57:12.460 --> 00:57:15.519
and moody lighting would have led to a lot of

00:57:15.519 --> 00:57:18.679
frustration. which is not what I wanted. So yeah,

00:57:18.760 --> 00:57:21.039
for that smaller specimen, just trying to have

00:57:21.039 --> 00:57:24.380
it where people can get up close and personal

00:57:24.380 --> 00:57:28.420
and see it as well was one thing. And then, yeah,

00:57:28.480 --> 00:57:32.780
I was lucky to get asked by Museums Victoria

00:57:32.780 --> 00:57:37.639
or Melbourne Museum to just supply them with

00:57:37.639 --> 00:57:41.340
some information on the pterosaurs that I described

00:57:41.340 --> 00:57:44.820
from here in Victoria, which are the... geologically

00:57:44.820 --> 00:57:47.679
oldest pterosaurs from australia as part of their

00:57:47.679 --> 00:57:50.940
victoria the t -rex exhibit so in terms of like

00:57:50.940 --> 00:57:54.559
the graphics and that i didn't really help with

00:57:54.559 --> 00:57:56.519
that side of things i gave them the information

00:57:56.519 --> 00:57:59.079
um and then yeah it was a delight to sort of

00:57:59.079 --> 00:58:01.699
see that brought to life and a joy to know that

00:58:01.699 --> 00:58:05.840
for the brief window of period uh the brief window

00:58:05.840 --> 00:58:09.400
of time that was on display it got seen by somewhere

00:58:09.400 --> 00:58:13.900
between 200 000 to 250 000 people If they turned

00:58:13.900 --> 00:58:16.099
around and weren't too distracted by the T -Rex

00:58:16.099 --> 00:58:19.739
that was behind them. But yeah, otherwise, Ferro

00:58:19.739 --> 00:58:24.599
Draco is, for anyone who does a tour of the lab

00:58:24.599 --> 00:58:27.260
at Age of Dinosaurs, Ferro Draco is mentioned

00:58:27.260 --> 00:58:31.800
explicitly. And it's been seen by, since October

00:58:31.800 --> 00:58:36.280
2019, like 270 ,000 people. That makes me so

00:58:36.280 --> 00:58:38.199
proud. Like, I have said this a bunch of times.

00:58:38.260 --> 00:58:40.820
If I get hit by a bus tomorrow, I know I did

00:58:40.820 --> 00:58:44.340
right. I know I like I partnered with a museum.

00:58:44.460 --> 00:58:47.500
A lot of museums, they have their holotypes sort

00:58:47.500 --> 00:58:50.159
of in a back room or in a storage area. Only

00:58:50.159 --> 00:58:52.099
maybe three or four people get to see them a

00:58:52.099 --> 00:58:55.840
year. Whereas the fossil that I got to work on

00:58:55.840 --> 00:58:58.320
because they believed in me, they gave me a massive

00:58:58.320 --> 00:59:01.380
opportunity. It has made a real difference. Those

00:59:01.380 --> 00:59:04.619
museums, those regional communities, they really

00:59:04.619 --> 00:59:07.920
heavily rely on paleo tourism. They rely on people

00:59:07.920 --> 00:59:11.800
going out and visiting the area. you know, a

00:59:11.800 --> 00:59:13.559
lot of the time they're sort of like retired,

00:59:13.699 --> 00:59:17.480
but we also would just get so many kids who came

00:59:17.480 --> 00:59:20.260
specifically to the museum. They begged their

00:59:20.260 --> 00:59:22.840
parents because they love dinosaurs and they

00:59:22.840 --> 00:59:26.480
wanted to see that stuff. Like that is super

00:59:26.480 --> 00:59:28.380
special to me. That is the most important part

00:59:28.380 --> 00:59:31.920
of my work. I don't really care. Like the naming

00:59:31.920 --> 00:59:35.340
things, it does help not having that understanding

00:59:35.340 --> 00:59:38.199
of the specimens. It does help, but seeing it

00:59:38.199 --> 00:59:43.329
translated into something, that inspires the

00:59:43.329 --> 00:59:45.849
next generation to be like, wow, I didn't think

00:59:45.849 --> 00:59:48.670
you could do paleontology in this country. That

00:59:48.670 --> 00:59:51.070
is something I'm super proud of. Yeah, these

00:59:51.070 --> 00:59:53.989
museums are a big part of the local communities.

00:59:54.130 --> 00:59:56.389
And I only know of one in Canada, and that's

00:59:56.389 --> 00:59:58.610
obviously the Royal Terrell Museum. And it's

00:59:58.610 --> 01:00:01.070
a similar thing. It's a small little community,

01:00:01.130 --> 01:00:03.449
and their only real tourism is bringing into

01:00:03.449 --> 01:00:07.170
that amazing museum. So yeah, that type of work

01:00:07.170 --> 01:00:11.019
is crazy good. I also noticed, though, Besides

01:00:11.019 --> 01:00:13.960
the fantastic work you're doing with the museums

01:00:13.960 --> 01:00:16.039
and trying to make being like their scientific

01:00:16.039 --> 01:00:19.900
advisor for some of these fossils, you're also

01:00:19.900 --> 01:00:25.699
doing that for a children's book. Yeah. Remind

01:00:25.699 --> 01:00:27.699
me as well. And I'll circle back to the current

01:00:27.699 --> 01:00:31.440
like stuff I'm doing with Holiskia. But yes,

01:00:31.460 --> 01:00:35.139
I've been working with a wonderful illustrator

01:00:35.139 --> 01:00:38.179
called Andrew Plant. He's done a number of children's

01:00:38.179 --> 01:00:43.030
books. And he wanted to make something that is

01:00:43.030 --> 01:00:47.590
all about Ferret Draco. So it was so funny when

01:00:47.590 --> 01:00:49.750
he first emailed me because I think Holiskia

01:00:49.750 --> 01:00:53.469
had just been announced. And he was already well

01:00:53.469 --> 01:00:55.809
into the process. I think he'd already pitched

01:00:55.809 --> 01:00:59.769
things with the publisher, which is CSIRO. And

01:00:59.769 --> 01:01:03.250
he was like, ah! just my luck as I'm, you know,

01:01:03.250 --> 01:01:05.349
just about ready to get this or, you know, it's

01:01:05.349 --> 01:01:07.449
like 80 % complete, you name another new species.

01:01:07.710 --> 01:01:09.550
Well, I hope you don't mind, but we'll make it

01:01:09.550 --> 01:01:11.469
about for a drake. And I was like, yeah, absolutely.

01:01:12.489 --> 01:01:15.849
So I did, yeah, scientific advising with that,

01:01:15.929 --> 01:01:20.570
working with Andrew, who anytime I've worked

01:01:20.570 --> 01:01:24.369
with a paleo artist, the questions that they

01:01:24.369 --> 01:01:28.409
bring. just make me level up in terms of my understanding

01:01:28.409 --> 01:01:30.590
because they honestly ask me questions that I

01:01:30.590 --> 01:01:34.130
just haven't thought of as a scientist. I found

01:01:34.130 --> 01:01:37.090
the same when I was working with Peter Trusler

01:01:37.090 --> 01:01:41.150
for the Australia Post stamp series. Some of

01:01:41.150 --> 01:01:44.070
those emails were like 4 ,000 words of just answering

01:01:44.070 --> 01:01:47.570
his questions, so it was super good. So yeah,

01:01:47.789 --> 01:01:53.719
it... It also features some of the other Cretaceous

01:01:53.719 --> 01:01:57.840
fossils that are found in Queensland. But essentially,

01:01:58.159 --> 01:02:00.739
Ferro Draco is the main character, and I am absolutely

01:02:00.739 --> 01:02:03.440
thrilled with that. It's just something that

01:02:03.440 --> 01:02:06.699
I wouldn't have... If you'd told me five years

01:02:06.699 --> 01:02:11.639
ago, or ten years ago, that a fossil that I named

01:02:11.639 --> 01:02:13.679
would be featured in a picture book, I would

01:02:13.679 --> 01:02:16.960
have told you not. hepped up on goofballs um

01:02:16.960 --> 01:02:20.840
but yeah so it's it's basically done but it will

01:02:20.840 --> 01:02:25.519
be scheduled for release in early 2026 so you

01:02:25.519 --> 01:02:26.940
won't be able to snatch it up this christmas

01:02:26.940 --> 01:02:29.920
but um if you follow me on socials i will definitely

01:02:29.920 --> 01:02:34.039
be crowing about it and yeah um just to circle

01:02:34.039 --> 01:02:39.159
back to the stuff with holistia so when when

01:02:39.159 --> 01:02:42.510
things like So they had this new pterosaur and

01:02:42.510 --> 01:02:44.969
they're like, all right, we need to move all

01:02:44.969 --> 01:02:47.389
our pterosaur specimens because we've got to

01:02:47.389 --> 01:02:49.369
try and keep them all together. But there's quite

01:02:49.369 --> 01:02:52.630
a lot that exceeds these two display cabinets.

01:02:53.610 --> 01:02:57.510
So initially, I just kind of modified one of

01:02:57.510 --> 01:03:01.869
the scientific figures for a display to try and

01:03:01.869 --> 01:03:04.789
show which bones were where on the specimen.

01:03:05.599 --> 01:03:08.460
But I'm working with a friend, Zev Landys, on

01:03:08.460 --> 01:03:12.199
basically trying to revamp that exhibition space.

01:03:12.579 --> 01:03:15.860
So we, through the Regional Arts and Development

01:03:15.860 --> 01:03:20.079
Fund, are potentially going to be going up to

01:03:20.079 --> 01:03:26.300
Queensland to have a look at the space and really

01:03:26.300 --> 01:03:29.519
try and figure out what can our budget handle?

01:03:29.599 --> 01:03:33.820
Can we... incorporate some amazing 3d prints

01:03:33.820 --> 01:03:37.679
um from some artists can we potentially sort

01:03:37.679 --> 01:03:40.340
of get some of that artwork that gabrielle guetta

01:03:40.340 --> 01:03:43.320
already did and have it in the space and how

01:03:43.320 --> 01:03:46.019
do we also like tie everything together and have

01:03:46.019 --> 01:03:49.699
a beautiful like cohesive story and then how

01:03:49.699 --> 01:03:51.960
do we condense that down as well for younger

01:03:51.960 --> 01:03:57.500
visitors um to have not so much like just walls

01:03:57.500 --> 01:04:00.800
of text and information but how do we have questions

01:04:00.800 --> 01:04:03.119
for them to engage with and get them really thinking

01:04:03.119 --> 01:04:07.860
about what is in front of them. Yeah. There seems

01:04:07.860 --> 01:04:09.679
to be so much outreach stuff that you're involved

01:04:09.679 --> 01:04:13.699
with. Yeah. Just in STEM in general, including

01:04:13.699 --> 01:04:15.840
you said already at the top that you have your

01:04:15.840 --> 01:04:18.980
own podcast. So maybe this is a good time to

01:04:18.980 --> 01:04:21.460
like call that out and anything else that you

01:04:21.460 --> 01:04:23.480
really feel like needs to be really flagged right

01:04:23.480 --> 01:04:26.869
here. Oh, okay. Well, if I don't tell you about

01:04:26.869 --> 01:04:29.449
the book that will be out before Christmas, like,

01:04:29.510 --> 01:04:32.949
my friend will probably tackle me into the ground.

01:04:33.230 --> 01:04:35.349
Okay, well, I wasn't aware of it, so I didn't

01:04:35.349 --> 01:04:40.889
know to ask. Yeah, no, that's fine. So, it's

01:04:40.889 --> 01:04:42.530
only been announced, I think, in the last, like,

01:04:42.530 --> 01:04:45.969
week or two, but a really good friend of mine

01:04:45.969 --> 01:04:49.989
called Dr. Cesar Pushmeran, he is a wildlife

01:04:49.989 --> 01:04:55.179
veterinarian. And he asked me to be part of this

01:04:55.179 --> 01:04:59.039
amazing book called Nature People. So initially,

01:04:59.099 --> 01:05:02.199
when he was working on it, he wanted to call

01:05:02.199 --> 01:05:06.440
it Wardens. And, you know, it sort of features

01:05:06.440 --> 01:05:10.699
different Australian naturalists as protectors

01:05:10.699 --> 01:05:14.360
of the things that they work on. So for quite

01:05:14.360 --> 01:05:18.579
a few of them, say Steve Haslam, for example.

01:05:19.320 --> 01:05:23.119
who is the founder of Quall Headquarters. He's

01:05:23.119 --> 01:05:28.619
trying to champion these like feisty little critters.

01:05:28.820 --> 01:05:32.760
There's someone who's an expert at insects. We

01:05:32.760 --> 01:05:35.980
have people working on bats as well. And then

01:05:35.980 --> 01:05:37.400
obviously I'm a little bit different because

01:05:37.400 --> 01:05:39.639
the things that I'm working to protect are dead.

01:05:40.579 --> 01:05:45.440
So, you know, they're already extinct. But to

01:05:45.440 --> 01:05:49.239
my mind, you know, fossils. fossils are a finite

01:05:49.239 --> 01:05:53.059
resource they will never exist again and looking

01:05:53.059 --> 01:05:56.219
after the fossils that we have and trying to

01:05:56.219 --> 01:05:59.480
learn what we can about them especially for stuff

01:05:59.480 --> 01:06:01.780
from the cretaceous when you have like elevated

01:06:01.780 --> 01:06:05.559
atmospheric co2 like increased temperatures across

01:06:05.559 --> 01:06:09.000
the board it's just interesting to see how different

01:06:09.000 --> 01:06:12.659
animal groups respond to those conditions especially

01:06:12.659 --> 01:06:15.940
when you've got a group say like sharks for example

01:06:15.940 --> 01:06:20.000
when all of the families that we have today they

01:06:20.000 --> 01:06:23.719
first popped up in the cretaceous period so you

01:06:23.719 --> 01:06:29.639
have all of that going on but um yeah so i was

01:06:29.639 --> 01:06:32.500
interviewed for it for a like a while ago um

01:06:32.500 --> 01:06:34.800
but caesar did like yeah such an amazing job

01:06:34.800 --> 01:06:37.260
it's a beautiful book he shot all of the photos

01:06:37.260 --> 01:06:41.579
on 35 millimeter film and It honestly has like

01:06:41.579 --> 01:06:43.960
some of my favorite photos of me in here. And

01:06:43.960 --> 01:06:46.380
I realize I sound like a psychopath and a narcissist

01:06:46.380 --> 01:06:50.679
to say that, but like I was wearing no makeup.

01:06:50.679 --> 01:06:53.619
I felt so, I felt pretty burnt out when those

01:06:53.619 --> 01:06:56.380
photos were taken, to be honest. We just had

01:06:56.380 --> 01:06:59.059
Caesar on vet placement on our farm and then

01:06:59.059 --> 01:07:01.139
we were going to start shearing for like three

01:07:01.139 --> 01:07:06.219
weeks. So basically for me, that's like 12 to

01:07:06.219 --> 01:07:09.980
14 hour days nonstop for three weeks. Plus having

01:07:09.980 --> 01:07:14.000
to cook for everyone. Um, but yeah, like those

01:07:14.000 --> 01:07:17.239
photos are just so light and, oh, they're, they're

01:07:17.239 --> 01:07:20.780
amazing. Um, so that is available for pre -order

01:07:20.780 --> 01:07:24.519
now and pre -orders, um, or the book will come

01:07:24.519 --> 01:07:27.460
out on the 28th of November. Um, so again, that's

01:07:27.460 --> 01:07:31.400
Nature People, uh, by Dr. Cesar Pujamaran, um,

01:07:31.519 --> 01:07:35.719
published by Affirm Press. So yeah, super excited

01:07:35.719 --> 01:07:41.940
for that. And then, yeah, as you said, I have

01:07:41.940 --> 01:07:45.679
a podcast called Pals in Paleo. I don't think

01:07:45.679 --> 01:07:48.659
I've released any new episodes this year because

01:07:48.659 --> 01:07:51.099
I've just been in the depths and the dungeon

01:07:51.099 --> 01:07:54.199
of thesis writing. But now that I'm sort of like

01:07:54.199 --> 01:07:57.320
in a groggy haze, like kind of clawing my way

01:07:57.320 --> 01:08:00.159
back into finding the new normal, hopefully there'll

01:08:00.159 --> 01:08:03.699
be some episodes or my laptop sadly died as I

01:08:03.699 --> 01:08:08.099
was writing my thesis as well. uh like wading

01:08:08.099 --> 01:08:10.920
through the wreckage and trying to recover like

01:08:10.920 --> 01:08:15.139
files and stuff has been been like it's been

01:08:15.139 --> 01:08:17.460
in the too hard basket for a few different reasons

01:08:17.460 --> 01:08:20.539
but i'm hoping that i can try and like salvage

01:08:20.539 --> 01:08:23.560
some audio that i recorded but didn't like cobble

01:08:23.560 --> 01:08:26.720
together into episodes at some point um otherwise

01:08:26.720 --> 01:08:30.060
yeah i've been doing school visits um gave my

01:08:30.060 --> 01:08:32.199
first keynote presentation at a school this year

01:08:32.199 --> 01:08:35.989
which was amazing um spoken at some school assemblies

01:08:35.989 --> 01:08:38.930
and yeah part of this program called stem pals

01:08:38.930 --> 01:08:42.510
um so science technology engineering mathematics

01:08:42.510 --> 01:08:46.210
pals and it's just kind of like a sweet letter

01:08:46.210 --> 01:08:48.470
writing program i always wanted a pen pal as

01:08:48.470 --> 01:08:52.770
a kid but now i get to do that as an adult and

01:08:52.770 --> 01:08:56.189
basically just show kids that there are a range

01:08:56.189 --> 01:08:58.590
of different careers you can have if you're interested

01:08:58.590 --> 01:09:03.630
in stem but also like scientists aren't you know

01:09:03.630 --> 01:09:07.010
just a jack -in -the -box of like they do science

01:09:07.010 --> 01:09:08.970
like they're in the lab and then you know the

01:09:08.970 --> 01:09:10.369
lid gets turned off and then they just power

01:09:10.369 --> 01:09:13.270
down no we're real people we have interests um

01:09:13.270 --> 01:09:16.510
i'm still super interested into i'm still super

01:09:16.510 --> 01:09:19.270
into pokemon um my little gift to myself has

01:09:19.270 --> 01:09:22.029
been trying to replay or play for the first time

01:09:22.029 --> 01:09:24.670
soul silver the gen 2 remake on the nintendo

01:09:24.670 --> 01:09:29.729
ds so yeah all kinds of different things that's

01:09:29.729 --> 01:09:32.600
amazing that you're able to keep all of Most

01:09:32.600 --> 01:09:36.739
of that still kind of juggling and finish your

01:09:36.739 --> 01:09:39.920
thesis on top of it. But we've come to the dreaded

01:09:39.920 --> 01:09:41.760
question, the hardest question here on Whimsical

01:09:41.760 --> 01:09:44.199
Wavelengths, the one that I pose to every single

01:09:44.199 --> 01:09:46.340
guest that comes on. It's the traditional last

01:09:46.340 --> 01:09:50.060
question. What is your favorite science joke?

01:09:50.680 --> 01:09:55.060
All right, let's keep it thematic. Why can't

01:09:55.060 --> 01:09:58.680
you hear a pterosaur go to the bathroom? I don't

01:09:58.680 --> 01:10:05.010
know why. Because the P is silent. Get it? Get

01:10:05.010 --> 01:10:09.430
it? It's spelled P -T -E -R -O. Yep. It's not

01:10:09.430 --> 01:10:12.649
the P you were thinking of, was it? Thank you

01:10:12.649 --> 01:10:16.109
so much for coming on. And I wish you all the

01:10:16.109 --> 01:10:19.930
best in the upcoming thesis defense. No worries.

01:10:19.989 --> 01:10:22.590
Thank you. I'm hoping it's going to be a little

01:10:22.590 --> 01:10:25.810
bit of fun when I have to do my, it's called

01:10:25.810 --> 01:10:29.140
my Milestone 3 presentation. big presentation

01:10:29.140 --> 01:10:32.199
you have to give before you submit your thesis.

01:10:33.199 --> 01:10:37.479
One of my panel members prefaced his question

01:10:37.479 --> 01:10:40.800
by saying, I have to ask you a question. Like,

01:10:40.859 --> 01:10:43.199
I am mandated to ask you a question. And then

01:10:43.199 --> 01:10:45.699
he pointed to a pterosaur toy on his desk, and

01:10:45.699 --> 01:10:48.479
I just got to, like, let loose and pop off about

01:10:48.479 --> 01:10:51.180
Kaiwazao Dabrowski, which is great. So I'm hoping

01:10:51.180 --> 01:10:54.079
it has a similar energy to that. Okay, well,

01:10:54.180 --> 01:10:56.460
that one went a little longer than I had hoped.

01:10:57.279 --> 01:10:59.939
So I'll keep the end bits nice and short. Quite

01:10:59.939 --> 01:11:01.840
frankly, at this very moment, I don't even know

01:11:01.840 --> 01:11:04.699
what's coming up next. I have a couple of irons

01:11:04.699 --> 01:11:07.220
in the fire for two different interviews. I also

01:11:07.220 --> 01:11:09.340
have a solo episode that I've been working on,

01:11:09.420 --> 01:11:12.399
all about the planets and the process of science.

01:11:13.420 --> 01:11:15.880
I've also gotten back somewhat recently from

01:11:15.880 --> 01:11:19.640
Saudi Arabia and the ensuing viral infection

01:11:19.640 --> 01:11:22.140
that came with the plane ride. No, it wasn't

01:11:22.140 --> 01:11:24.140
COVID, but it still knocked me out for a week.

01:11:25.119 --> 01:11:29.260
Joys. Anyway, I'll see you in two weeks. I hope

01:11:29.260 --> 01:11:31.840
you enjoyed this one, and by all means, subscribe,

01:11:32.119 --> 01:11:35.960
leave me a rating, and of course, send me questions

01:11:35.960 --> 01:11:40.239
or show ideas or whatever. Don't be afraid, tag

01:11:40.239 --> 01:12:04.020
me on social media. Cheers. As the galaxies fly

01:12:04.020 --> 01:12:04.680
by