In 2023, CollectA followed up on the success of their 2022 Deluxe Triceratops with a smaller version for their standard line of prehistoric toys. Triceratops, of course, is one of those “A-list” dinosaurs that pretty much everybody knows and has no shortage of toys to its name, so let’s see how this one measures up. The official name for this toy is “Triceratops Confronting,”...
Before we begin the review, I would like to extend my gratitude towards Happy Hen Toys for sending this figure along as a review sample. Happy Hen Toys is a U.S. distributor of animal figures and one of the only places in the country where you can get CollectA figures at a reasonable price. Check out their selection by clicking...
The very first Australian prehistoric mammal to be named and described (by Sir Richard Owen back in 1838), Diprotodon is by far the biggest marsupial that we know of. A mature male would have been over 4 metres long, 1.8 metres tall at the shoulders, and weighed at least 2800 kg, which is heavier than a male hippopotamus and rivalling a male...
Sniffing silently at the entrance of the small hole in the ground, Mammock decisively detects dinner. She raises her head and glances toward her mate, Mangle, who has located a second hole a dozen metres away. The two bob and jerk their heads in silent argument before Mammock finally snorts in irritation and begins clawing and scraping at the hole,...
The very first time I laid eyes on the Early Cretaceous ankylosaurian known as Polacanthus was at a birthday party when I was only four or five years old. I can’t rightly recall if it was my own or some other child’s, but I’ll never forget that wrapping paper. Someone had brought a gift done up in dinosaur-themed paper. And...
Most ankylosaurs are classified as either Ankylosauridae or Nodosauridae. Ankylosaurids are easily distinguishable by their wide, blocky heads and tails terminating in solid bone clubs, and include the likes of Ankylosaurus itself, Euoplocephalus, Jinyunpelta, Pinacosaurus, and Zuul. By contrast, nodosaurids like Animantarx, Borealopelta, Edmontonia, Gastonia, and Sauropelta are distinguished by their narrower, more triangular heads and clubless tails. But there’s...
Review and images by bmathison1972; edited by Suspsy Dreadnoughtus schrani is a titanosaur from the Late Cretaceous (Campanian to Maastrichtian) of present-day South America. Remains of only two individuals have been described to date, both from the Cerro Fortaleza Formation in Argentina. Dreadnoughtus was one of the largest dinosaurs; estimations put its total length at approximately 26 meters and its...
For many years, the only described spinosaur from the United Kingdom was the famous baryonychine Baryonyx. That finally changed in 2021 with the announcement of two additional species: Riparovenator milnerae and Ceratosuchops inferdios. Both were discovered in the Wessex Formation on the Isle of Wight, both are estimated to have been around 8.5 metres in length, and both have been...
Nanuqsaurus (“polar bear lizard”) is a poorly understood Alaskan tyrannosaurine that lived around 68 to 70 million years ago. Although it is presently known only from fragments of skull and an array of teeth, it recently received a major boost of publicity in 2022 by appearing in the first season of the fabulous Apple TV series Prehistoric Planet. There it...
Discovered in the Lealt Shale Formation on the Isle of Skye in Scotland in 2017, Dearc sgiathanach (pronounced ‘jark ski-a-naw-ka’) was a Middle Jurassic rhamphorhynchine pterosaur, and quite a large one at that. Its precise size is uncertain, but the estimated wingspan is between 1.9 and 3.8 metres, which makes it the largest known aligerous animal of its time as...
Before we begin the review, I would like to thank Happy Hen Toys for supplying this figure for review. Happy Hen Toys is a U.S. distributor of animal figurines and a member and supporter of the Dinosaur Toy Blog and Forum. Of particular note is that they’re one of the few U.S. distributors that stocks CollectA figurines. Check out their...
Although only known from 35 bones and some teeth from a single specimen, Hadrosaurus is more significant than its fragmentary remains would suggest. Hadrosaurus foulkii was first described by Joseph Leidy in 1858 from remains found in New Jersey’s Woodbury Formation. It is the first dinosaur ever discovered in the United States and the first dinosaur skeleton to ever be...
