Axel Sauro

On other social media, every single animal post inevitably has someone insinuating it's AI. It doesn't even have to be outlandish, literally just any wild animal doing whatever. I honestly have a hard time differentiating trolls, bots and genuinely ignorant people at this point.

𝗗𝗼𝗻'𝘁 𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗻 𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗳𝗹𝗮𝘀𝗵𝗹𝗶𝗴-

Combining all known informations and previous work achievements, we can see the palaeoenvironmental at the northwestern corner of the Tibetan Plateau during the Early Pleistocene is more likely a moist, mosaic of environments (including massifs, grasslands, woodlands). 5/

Recently, a newly discovered pliohyracid cranium (which been refered to Postschizotherium cf. intermedium) indicated something more about this enigmatic clade of Giant Hyrax. The Cranium was found from Longdan locality, Gansu, China. 2/

Postschizotherium intermedium, a large Pliohyracids with a hippo-like head. For almost a hundred year, people can only learn about this animal through its skulls and teeth. With no any thing about the postcranial, it's very hard to accurately reconstruct the entire body shape. 1/

I'd see no issue with that...
... If the sauropod was a juvenile

I just learned about Dear Fauna, a STOP MOTION, FELT animation about pleistocene.
It releases in just a couple days. Let's show it some love!

Reconstructions of Sinomacrops (top) flying and hunting an insect, Cascocauda (center) flying and Anurognathus (bottom) on the ground in a defensive posture

Some flying muppets, Anurognathid pterosaurs

These were small, likely insectivorous pterosaurs that are known from almost complete skeletons which preserve important details of the filaments that covered their bodies

They were probably nocturnal and highly maneuverable flyers

🐡 🎨 🧪 #paleontology

Results from the Ocher sub-assemblage zone! This was our first look into the Permian of Russia. The Russian Permian was for the longest time the biggest influence on our idea of this period, besides the red beds in the US. Never the less we rarely think of these formations etc.

Otodontid and smaller sharks snacking on a large Llanocetus. #paleoart

Yeah they often sever the spinal column on impact, it's not usually a clean cut but the effect is the same.

Very hard to tell from fossils, but the strongly aerodynamic outer shape, robust wingtips and narial tubercles to breathe at higher speeds would be our best bets.

Microraptor being slightly bigger than a peregrine falcon tells you everything you need to know about its potential as a predator. Sure it wouldn't have decapitated its prey at lightning speed, but I'm sure it terrorised the smaller coeval fauna.

Kaiju-God goes hard though

... That said, PhP megalodon would go hard. It basically only has been represented as a monster in media, so far.

Ngl, I could totally see "Ice Age" just being a marketing term because it's definitely more popular than "Pleistocene", but I'm assuming they're staying around that time frame as well.

Llanocetus final rest

The concept art is yet again not fitting for a Jurassic movie, but it's way cooler. Indeed basically mutos, but mutos are cool at least.

I want that!

Spec evo? That's for stinky nerds, take some GMO wyverns and a beluga rancor instead.

Definitely dying/sick. Closed eyes, arched back, puffed fur, staying in plain sight... Not good signs.

While watching I was under the impression it would've worked better as a new take on Skull Island.

🧪🦣🏺 Who wants to hear a story about biotech billions, unscientific claims, and shoddy smear tactics attacking women in science*?

Thread 🧵

*which, for legal clarity, are totally denied as being connected

A green, blackish and yellow colubrid snake coiled around a dead branch.

The fossil leatherback Eosphargis, shown with a primarily dark body.

The super-famous mosasaur Tylosaurus hangs in the water with tiny fish and not-so-tiny sharks swimming around it. Sometimes mosasaurs just hung out, thinking mosasaury thoughts. They may have looked like this when doing so.

A Stenopterygius mother expels a swarm of babies in a shallow lagoon. The offspring eat one another's yolk sacs because... kids, amirite?

I've uploaded a tonne of hi-res #paleoart to #Patreon this week, all of it accompanied by articles covering what we know about the colours of the depicted species. It might be worth a read if you're curious about reconstructing extinct animals. www.patreon.com/markwitton #fossils #sciart

Fossils of the peculiarly crested, lizard-like Mirasaura. Left, the holotype with a partial skeleton (skull faces to the right) with a partially preserved series of skin appendages; right, a more complete, substantially larger series of appendages disassociated from its skeleton.

Working on #paleoart of the fantastic new drepanosaur Mirasaura today. I don't think it's mentioned in the paper, but there's a significant size range in the skin appendages: here's the biggest isolated example vs. the (juvenile) holotype. Neat. #fossil #paleontology

Funny that's exactly how it goes for extant crocodilians as well

I'm not against de-extinction at all as a concept (although I'm skeptical of its mid-short term potential and I'm aware of how careful we should be with the implications), so it's genuinely depressing that an organization with disgusting behaviour tainted it for who knows how long.

You’ll all have seen the many announcements and PR pieces from #ColossalBiosciences. There are reasons to be concerned about the general message promoted by CB, one being that it is seen >by some< (US politicians in particular) as meaning that we can devalue conservation. A 🧵 1/n

Massive sharp incisors are no joke

Or maybe it's yet another timeline