Re: Dryptosaurus, Deltadromeus, and Bahariasaurus

["Thomas R. Holtz, Jr." <th81@umail.umd.edu>]

At 12:35 PM 12/15/97 -0600, Seth wrote:

>Based on what was found of Deltadromeus, I kind of figured that.  What was
>the skull based on?  Best guess with some inference from Dryptosaurus
>material?

No, just imagination (there is very little known of the skull of Drypto,
either!).  If they had kept it a generic-looking tetanurine, that wouldn't
be glad.  However, they stick on this three-pronged lacrimal, which I
strongly suspect is going to show up in published art in the next few
years...  Ugh!

>>There do not seem to be any characters especially linking Deltadromeus or
>>Dryptosaurus and either the Spinosauridae or the Coelophysidae.  The
>>spinosaurid-coelophysid link is weaker than once thought, now that the
>>anatomy of the former is better known (and is pretty clearly tetanurine).
>
>How is the anatomy of Spinosauridae better known?  They didn't find more of
>Spinosaurus did they?  I assume you mean with the recent study of Baryonyx?

Well, the HAVE found new Spinosaurus material, including a skull.  However,
the published material concerns Baryonyx and the Brazilian forms.

Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
Vertebrate Paleontologist     Webpage: http://www.geol.umd.edu
Dept. of Geology              Email:th81@umail.umd.edu
University of Maryland        Phone:301-405-4084
College Park, MD  20742       Fax:  301-314-9661