Coloration Revealed for Marine Reptiles?

[Takama]

First Feathered Dinosaurs, now marine Reptiles.  What do you all think of this?

http://www.livescience.com/42415-ancient-marine-beast-color.html

[Balaur]

I find it intresting, but I have a problem with "all ichthyosaurs may be completely black." I find that a huge leap, especially if the scientist is saying that. It is intresting, but I don't like the conclusion they made.

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

Interesting, guess I always assumed it was a possibility.  I do like a bit more color and patterns though.

[Paleogene Pals]

Woo hoo! Now painting my marine reptiles will be a cinch.  Black topside, white underside with some mottled pattern between the two to break up the outline of the creature. Instead, of figuring out paint schemes anymore, I'm going to sit back and let the scientists discover what color these critters were. 

[Pachyrhinosaurus]

That's a great find! I hope the producers of Jurassic World are paying attention (that is, if they're still going to use marine reptiles). I think it is fascinating to know the colors of animals' scales, first the supposed striping on the tail of edmontosaurus, and now this. Just wonderful.   

[tyrantqueen]

I was never a fan of brightly coloured marine reptiles anyway. Most large marine animals alive today are shades of blue, grey, black and with white underneath:

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

I was never a fan of brightly coloured marine reptiles anyway. Most large marine animals alive today are shades of blue, grey, black and with white underneath:

Though those still have some really neat patterns.  There other large ocean dwellers like sharks that have colors and patterns as well.

[Everything_Dinosaur]

The research from Lund University certainly extends the potential knowledge base with regards to inferring colouration from the fossil record beyond proto-feathers and other integuments.  We (Everything Dinosaur) did stress two points regarding this article.

Firstly, that given the diversity of the Ichthyosauria, it would be difficult to imagine all Ichthyosaurs as dark coloured or black, although we note that the Early Jurassic specimen studied did show evidence of biochrome preservation that indicated the possibility of an all over dark colouration.

Secondly, other biochromes responsible for different interpretations of the colour of an extinct organism may not have been detected simply because our current technology limits this or indeed, such natural pigments and the material evidence for them may not have survived the fossilisation process as well.

The paper (available in the academic journal Nature), certainly has added to the debate and we suspect further studies, including more work on the colouration of the Pterosauria will take place.

For reference, here is our own blog article: Marine Reptiles in "Little Black Numbers"

We also looked briefly at how Safari Ltd has interpreted counter shading and black colouration on a couple of the marine animal models.

Hope this helps.

[DinoToyForum]

Yeah, I'd be hesitant to extrapolate the colour of all species from one small data point.

[Balaur]

Yeah, I'd be hesitant to extrapolate the colour of all species from one small data point.

Do you think it is the fault of the media, or the scientists?

[DinoToyForum]

Yeah, I'd be hesitant to extrapolate the colour of all species from one small data point.

Do you think it is the fault of the media, or the scientists?

Media.

[tanystropheus]

...that Schleich Elasmosaurus is looking a bit accurate now

[Concavenator]

What a pity!The CollectA Mosasaurus ( most accurate mosasaur figure ) gets revealed the last day of November and it gets out of date in there first days of January! 

[DinoToyForum]

...that Schleich Elasmosaurus is looking a bit accurate now

The study didn't include any sauropterygians so the jury is still out completely on plesiosaur colour.

[alexeratops]

Wow, cool! I'ts not just birds anymore!

[Yutyrannus]

Very interesting that they can do this with marine reptiles, now, but just because a few mosasaurs, a leatherback turtle, and an ichthyosaur are black doesn't mean all marine reptiles were (including other mosasaurs, turtles, and ichthyosaurus).

[Yutyrannus]

What a pity!The CollectA Mosasaurus ( most accurate mosasaur figure ) gets revealed the last day of November and it gets out of date in there first days of January! 

Unless the mosasaur in the study was Mosasaurus itself, it isn't inaccurate.

[Ridureyu]

What are you talking about?  Everybody knows that all prehistoric creatures had feathers!

[Concavenator]

What a pity!The CollectA Mosasaurus ( most accurate mosasaur figure ) gets revealed the last day of November and it gets out of date in there first days of January! 

Unless the mosasaur in the study was Mosasaurus itself, it isn't inaccurate.

Yes,the CollectA one is a Mosasaurus,so the coloration is inaccurate.It's cool looking though.

What are you talking about?  Everybody knows that all prehistoric creatures had feathers!

Hah,how ironic! 

[Newt]

I think you misunderstood.  The study looked at one of the half-dozen species of Tylosaurus, not a Mosasaurus.  Extrapolating from that to any other mosasaur is unwarranted.  To see how much closely related and even fairly ecologically similar marine species can vary in color, just look at dolphins.  Likely variation would have been greater with Mesozoic marine reptiles; mammals are big on pattern, but conservative with colors compared to other vertebrate groups.

Another point is that the presence of eumelanin does not rule out the presence of other pigments or structural colors.  I've spent a lot of time staring at pickled fish through a microscope, and I can tell you, the melanin patterns seen in dead fish are not necessarily an accurate representation of how the animal looked in life.  Red and yellow pigments often fade soon after death.  You can see this in reptiles and amphibians too; road-killed green frogs or snakes soon turn blue, as the yellow xanthins degrade and only the blue structural color remains.

A third point- many reptiles shift the concentration of melanin within their epidermal cells to change color.  Chameleons are the most dramatic example, but the ability is quite widespread among reptiles.  Too, many reptiles have ontogenetic color changes.  It is possible any or all of the specimens examined may have been older, hypermelanistic individuals, as seen in many turtles and vipers, for example.

The study is very interesting and I don't wish to take away from it.  But as others have pointed out, this shouldn't be taken to mean that all Mesozoic marine reptiles were black- or even all individuals of the taxa examined.