RE: Moasaurus

["Thomas R. Holtz, Jr." <tholtz@geol.umd.edu>]

> From: owner-dinosaur@usc.edu [mailto:owner-dinosaur@usc.edu]On Behalf Of
> ELurio@aol.com
>
> Hm. How is this is known? >>
>
> Fossilized skin is very rare, but it has been found before.
> Carnotour skin
> was found several years ago, and made news because it DIDN'T show
> traces of
> feathers.

Actually, it made news because, for the first time, there was the relatively
complete integument of a large theropod, period.  No one at the time made
any sort of noise, pro or con, as the relationship of this to the nature of
bird origins.

Incidentally, although this material is featured in Steve Czerkas' chapter
"Skin" in Currie & Padian's Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs, the details of this
fossil have yet to be published (something many of us are looking forward to
seeing).

                Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
                Vertebrate Paleontologist
Department of Geology           Director, Earth, Life & Time Program
University of Maryland          College Park Scholars
                College Park, MD  20742
http://www.geol.umd.edu/~tholtz/tholtz.htm
http://www.geol.umd.edu/~jmerck/eltsite
Phone:  301-405-4084    Email:  tholtz@geol.umd.edu
Fax (Geol):  301-314-9661       Fax (CPS-ELT): 301-405-0796