Surviving K-T

[tanystropheus]

I once read a blog post suggesting that some hadrosaurs actually survived the K-T event by almost a million years.
Is there any truth to this? What is the source of that post?

Thanks.

[Counterklock]

There seems to be a trend in paleontology - every so often someone will publish a paper claiming that large dinosaurs survived the K-T mass extinction event for a time. Here's a few I found from googling:

https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/05/090501-dinosaur-lost-world.html

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/01/110127141707.htm + the actual paper for this one https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/gsa/geology/article/39/2/159/130513/Direct-UPb-dating-of-Cretaceous-and-Paleocene

I usually approach these with both skepticism and an open mind, because usually these cases are just a result of fossils being disturbed and washed into a younger rock formation or something... but also, perhaps it is possible that some isolated pockets of dinosaurs survived longer? Ultimately the end result is still the same in that they went extinct, likely dead clades walking, with dwindling genetic diversity and gene pools as time went on. Extinction debt could also have played a role. Ultimately the reason for their extinction still remains the same.

I'm still looking for more peer-reviewed material that backs up the paper listed above though


EDIT:

I found this paper that suggest that dinosaurs could have survived pas the KT Mass Extinction in the Hell Creek formation... but they also suggest that the extinction itself was not instantaneous as we often think it is, but a gradual dying off due to the change of habitat caused by disruptive events - 700,000 years is still just a blip in the geological time scale.

http://science.sciencemag.org/content/232/4750/629

[amargasaurus cazaui]

The San Juan Basin incident at least has been around for some time,  but it has been debunked rather well. From what I remember on the topic this one was not the result of bones being "reworked" or uncovered and then reburied in newer sediments, but rather an entire layer of strata representing a large time period was subverted below a large area of older sediment that was then raised uniformly in place over the newer materials. When discovered it appeared the dinosaurs in question in the upper layers had lived passed the extinction event, but once published using a more thorough examination of the geological context, it was disproven .

[Simon]

Didn't. Happen. (Probably.)  Zero. Proof. Logically. Extremely. Unlikely. Why? Well ...

I've addressed this topic many times before, but as I'm under the weather at the moment, I'm gonna take a nap instead of doing so again.   

PS - I just saw the last article linked is from 1986.  So its totally obsolete.

[Neosodon]

If any large dinosaurs did survive past the cretaceous extinction you would have to answer the difficult question of why they went extinct later.

[Simon]

If any large dinosaurs did survive past the cretaceous extinction you would have to answer the difficult question of why they went extinct later.

EXACTLY.  The most successful group of creatures, one that dominated every niche for 160 MY, land, sea, and air, would not go so easily - unless the catastrophe that hit them was so sudden, so totally encompassing, and so swift, that they never had a chance.

Even IF any larger creatures survived the initial firestorm that engulfed the globe - NONE of the dinosaurs survived the horrific global winter that followed - and completely ended the life cycle/food chain (ie all plants died, etc. etc.).

If you could not hibernate through it (like turtles, crocs);

If you didn't have means for keeping warm (like feathers, fur);

If your requirements for sustenance were HUGE (as those of multi-tonne warm-blooded creatures would be);

If you were too large to hide from the weather in burrows;

If you could not survive off the meager food available for several years;

YOU WENT EXTINCT.

That's why they (almost certainly) did NOT make it past the "K-T" boundary.

[tanystropheus]

If any large dinosaurs did survive past the cretaceous extinction you would have to answer the difficult question of why they went extinct later.

If you could not hibernate through it (like turtles, crocs);

But what if some dinosaurs could hibernate through it? 

[Simon]

If any large dinosaurs did survive past the cretaceous extinction you would have to answer the difficult question of why they went extinct later.

If you could not hibernate through it (like turtles, crocs);

But what if some dinosaurs could hibernate through it? 

Well, if ya wanna get technical ... some dinosaurs ... DID.

Avian Dinosaurs. 

[E.D.G.E. (PainterRex)]

I have yet to see why no one has ever mentioned the small dinosaurs that would've been able to do similar things that the other small animals were; small ceratopsians, maniraptorans, scansoriopteryx, etc.

[Loon]

According to some, many dinosaurs still live on an undiscovered island. One researcher even described humans and prehistoric beasts coexisting on the island.

[tanystropheus]

According to some, many dinosaurs still live on an undiscovered island. One researcher even described humans and prehistoric beasts coexisting on the island.

Are you referring to the Congo? It's not an island though, but Time-Life's Mysteries of the Unknown series explored that possibility.

Papua New Guinea would seem like a good candidate (especially, due to the frequency of living fossils and exotic fauna), in theory.

[Loon]

It was actually a dinotopia joke

[tanystropheus]

It was actually a dinotopia joke

I still haven't seen Dinotopia. I hope I'm not the only one 

[Loon]

It was actually a dinotopia joke

I still haven't seen Dinotopia. I hope I'm not the only one 

The mini-series/show were actually pretty crummy. The books on the other hand were much better, and beautiful to look at.

[Papi-Anon]

According to some, many dinosaurs still live on an undiscovered island. One researcher even described humans and prehistoric beasts coexisting on the island.

Not to be confused with two small islands of the coast of Costa Rica: where dinosaurs KILLED humans.

[Ramose]

It was actually a dinotopia joke

I still haven't seen Dinotopia. I hope I'm not the only one 

The mini-series/show were actually pretty crummy. The books on the other hand were much better, and beautiful to look at.

I'm glad I'm not the only Dinotopia nut on this forum!

[Dinoguy2]

There seems to be a trend in paleontology - every so often someone

Note: it's almost always the same guy, though often with different co-authors. The "trend" is like BAND- a bunch of people with a failed hypothesis who refuse to give it up. 100% of the so-called post-KT hadrosaur remains are reworked (that is, fossils that eroded out of the ground and then were reburied in the Cenozoic).

Papua New Guinea would seem like a good candidate (especially, due to the frequency of living fossils and exotic fauna), in theory.

Except Papua New Guinea has only been isolated for the past 80k years or so. It wasn't an island during the Ice Age but part of mainland Australia. If non-Avian dinosaurs survived we'd expect to find them in geologically old isolated places, like Australia, New Zealand, and Antarctica. But we don't. Anybody who says they can be in these places and remain undetected are operating under a pre-ecology understanding of science. As major parts of the good web they'd be noticed, and would have dramatic effects on the ecosystem which would be noticed.

[Lizerd]

I know I am a bit late on this, but this one looked interesting, so here is my views on the subject (don't take anything I say seriously , I have no qualification, other than being a dino fanatic). The Asteroid did not kill all dinosaurs, that's just not how extinction works, and before you sigh and look away thinking "oh he is just going to say that birds are dinosaurs (which they are!!!)", I got a surprise for you. MOST dinosaurs were killed, but a select few would survive for another few hundred to thousands of years. Simply put the population of them was so vast, so specialized, so adaptable, and extremist there would be survivors. Then how did they finally die out? Well they were now in competition with mammals, vegetation changes, and distance between mates. This would mean that the small percentage of survivors would shrink until they could not reach or find mates, ending dinosaurs. Of course this is speculation and most people could say it was all wrong 

[Dinoguy2]

I know I am a bit late on this, but this one looked interesting, so here is my views on the subject (don't take anything I say seriously , I have no qualification, other than being a dino fanatic). The Asteroid did not kill all dinosaurs, that's just not how extinction works, and before you sigh and look away thinking "oh he is just going to say that birds are dinosaurs (which they are!!!)", I got a surprise for you. MOST dinosaurs were killed, but a select few would survive for another few hundred to thousands of years. Simply put the population of them was so vast, so specialized, so adaptable, and extremist there would be survivors. Then how did they finally die out? Well they were now in competition with mammals, vegetation changes, and distance between mates. This would mean that the small percentage of survivors would shrink until they could not reach or find mates, ending dinosaurs. Of course this is speculation and most people could say it was all wrong 

I doubt anyone thinks the asteroid killed all these species instantly. I think they definitely would have survived another few thousand to tens of thousands of years in some places (time periods still too short to be detected in the fossil record). I don't think we need to invoke competition to explain this though. If the ecosystem changes too fast for species to adapt, they're done for. It might take a week or a hundred millennia but the species is doomed unless the ecosystem miraculously changes back to the way it was before. Which it never did. Ecosystems rebounded but they were different.

[Lizerd]

It would be interesting seeing how these ecosystems changed. Its also weird to think we are here because of a rock