Bone Yard XVI

Welcome to the 16th Boneyard Paleo Carnival. Let us dig back through time and strata to see what the blogosphere has worked out of the sediments of knowledge. Like my last hosting, this BY will follow the convention that the posts that deal with the more recent eras and periods will come first. So let us begin.

First up, not even out of the Holocene, Dr Micheal Ryan from Paleoblog brings our attention to the hands bones of Hadropithecus stenognathus, one odd lemur.

(Picture added for clarity for the following; pic credit, AMNH)

We wander back further and find ourselves looking in the mirror of our past in the Pleistocene, following the evolution and bushy branching of the hominid line. The controversy over our relatives, the so-called Hobbits, rages on. Greg Laden discusses the recent paper that staked out the claims that Homo floresiensis is in fact a separate species. John Hawks also weighs in on the H floresiensis and Palau pygmy population discoveries. John has been a busy beaver in general. He also has interesting posts on the Neandertals: their linguistic capabilities and whether or not genetic drift was responsible for their divergence from Homo sapiens. He also found the time to discuss the paleoecology at Hadar and the new study about Orrorin's bipediality. Afarensis also has a good post on the Palau island dwarfed skeletons.

Diverging from the hominid line, we find that over at The World We Don't Live In, there's a very good discussion of the deinotheres being tapir convergent probisceans. Also discussed there are the ever fascinating second attempt at theropods in the Cenozoic and whether or not Megatherium americanum was a carnivore specializing in glyphodonts!

Over at Nimravid's Blog, we have the discussion of a rather interesting and unique carnivore, Simocyon. Also discussed is the diet of big sabre tooth felids.

Chris Taylor over at Catalogue of Organisms has the odd ball of a whale that seems to thought it was a walrus!

Over at Archaeozoology, the discussion of the oldest known fossil of the rabbit family is quite interesting. Equally interesting, the discovery of fossil rhino bones has brought into question whether or not Anatolia was truly isolated up to the Oligocene as has been thought.

Transition backing across the iridium layer, we find ourselves working through the Mesozoic strata. Therein lies some interesting posts themselves. First up is whether or not the Deccan Traps were responsible for the demise of the dinosaurs over at Everything Dinosaur. My own post on the subject languished alas.

Amanda at Self-designed Student titillates us with another discussion of Dino Teen Sex. (degenerate dinos must repent!)

The ever reputable Darren Naish of Tetrapod Zoology comments on dual discoveries of the Cretaceous. The first being Nemicolopterus crypticus with Darren pointing out this fossil looks a lot like an underage representative of a known pterosaur and he continues on the uber sized anuran of Madagascar. He also has the most unforgivable set of pictures under the title of LOLSAUROPOD!

Zach Miller up at When Pigs Fly Returns has a great drawing (and the reasoning behind it) of Nyctosaurus. He also has up his latest Guess the Dino (no, that's not what its called).

Both Brian Switek of Laelaps and Manabu Sakamoto of the Raptor's Nest have good posts (here and here) about Megalosaurus and its problematic status. Manabu goes on to delightfully discuss Velociraptor mongoliensis and whether or not the uber alligatoroid Deinosuchus was cotemporal with T rex. Brian turns his attention to the newly discovered Cretaceous plesiosaur, Nichollsia borealis.

Over at the Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week, there is a fascinating expose on whether or not all giant sized sauropods exhibited pneumaticity. There's a uber tease about a giant vertebra found at the earliest Jurassic!

My own The Dragon's Tales has the OMG moment that the pterosaurs also had teen sex! Bad archosaur! Bad!

In the very early Mesozoic, Scott at the Coherent Lighthouse gives us a wonderful head study of Euparkaria.

Straddling the Mesozoic/Paleozoic transition with the Permian Extinction, I raised the question, based on the very recent research on the genetics of casein and the pseudogenes for vitellogenin, whether or not the nonmammalian therapsids might have been nursed their young. Just how basal is milk in the synapsid line?

Over at Real Climate, they take a hammer out to yet another claim of periodicity.

Brian Switek and Nimravid both blog about the complexity and evolution at the Ediacaran and Cambrian Explosions (here and here).

In the Vendian, Micheal Ryan at Paleoblog highlights the Ediacaran life form of Funisia dorothea.

And that, my fossilized friends, is the Boneyard Carnival for this edition. If I missed anyone, please drop me a note, and I will add your post. The Bone Yard XVII will be appearing at Greg Laden's place in two weeks. Until then, enjoy! And post more original work, folks! We're also lacking for Paleozoic posts here!