Eofauna: New for 2022

[Dinoguy2]

He explains that in his article about the "change in look in Deinocheirus".

The thing is that it is not actually a pygostyle like that of birds, but rather it is more similar to that of oviraptors and therizinosaurs... That is why another name is being considered, since this structure is not homologous in birds and deinocheirus.

So if that "pygostyle" is similar to that of oviraptors and therizinosaurus and no one doubts they were feathered ... for me, it's just perfectly plausible. More than it wasn't unfeathered.

But as mentioned, the rod shaped structure on these tails is not related to feathers. It's related to tail shortening. The fact that it's found in feathered species is just a coincidence because those are also the ones that have evolved short tails. There are plenty of known species with long tail feathers that do not have the fused rod, including some oviraptorosaurs. There are also some species that have the rod shaped "pygostyle" that do not have particularly long tail feathers, including Beipiaosaurus and even many enantiornithines. So it's not directly associated with feathers.

[GojiraGuy1954]

The argument against feathers on basis of size ignores other large theropods, such as Deinocheirus, that show evidence of feathers above the alleged weight based cut off point.

A lot of people have suggested pretty serious issues with the 2017 integument paper. Most notably that the tiny size of the impressions in question, and the lack of evidence for their assigned location on the body, do not make for strong evidence for a broad claim against feathers as the paper asserts.

To say that critiques are only relevant when published is frankly rather disrespectful and misunderstands a lot of the environment paleontology currently finds itself in. A lot of good work gets done outside of published papers, especially with regards to life reconstructions. And just because someone doesn't have a degree doesn't mean they can't come to correct interpretations, and in some cases that can actually be an advantage.

Paleontology degrees do not as a matter of standard train paleontologists in life reconstruction. Nor do the geology, archaeology, biology and microbiology degrees that most universities make someone get first (to say nothing of the math, language, etc. degrees). Life reconstruction is something someone needs to train themselves in the vast majority of the time, and you're going to find that experienced paleoartists, amateur and professional both, are typically going to have a better application for comparative anatomy and a more up to date knowledge base of relevant information, relative to a degree holding paleontologist who unless they approach these fields of their own volition, has no expectation of experience in life reconstructions.



At the risk of sounding like David Peters "the establishment is dumb cause I figured something out first", I can't help but remember being a child, an actual child, in the 2000's when Microraptor was at the peak of its hype. There was a Nova special that featured BANDits, for some sad reason, and it felt like a new paper on Microraptor was coming out every couple of months. An awful lot of them were wind tunnel studies, and no matter what new idea they had for leg poses or configurations, they could never get Microraptor to make sense as a gliding animal.

Right from the start, the papers were saying, frankly ad nausea with how many people did these same tests, that Microraptor was completely incapable of gliding to a relevant efficiency, and that it would only have gained lift while moving at speed, and yet all promoted the same conclusion that Microraptor was a gliding animal. As a small child of maybe 8 or 9, it was painfully, flagrantly, enragingly obvious that Microraptor flew. As someone who knew none of the physics or the terms regarding parts of the skeleton or aerodynamics, just from a vague ability to understand the context of the statements and data included and from reading the papers own conclusions/summaries, that much was clear.

And yet dozens of degree holding scientists ignored their own results for almost 15 years. I am by no means abnormally smart nor frankly do I believe I was a particularly smart child, anyone reading that data should have been able to come to the same conclusion, but they refused to see it. I'd pointed this out to people numerous times, always to be meet with "It didn't fly because it wasn't a bird". No reasoning, no explanation, just "because the culture in the field says no that means no". So I am of the mindset that oftentimes with life reconstruction outside opinions can hold considerable merit.

It would take a study on molting patterns of all things before the establishment finally acknowledged that Microraptor flew.

Animals closer to T. rex than Yutyrannus also show evidence of a scaly covering though

[Duna]

Animals closer to T. rex than Yutyrannus also show evidence of a scaly covering though

The fact is to know were the scaly covering was located, and that doesn't exclude that the rest of the body could have had feathers, even in tyrannosaurus rex. The location and size of those scales is important, and that's why the 2017 article required a very special analysis that most people omitted and decided that T-rex was scaly. Paleos discuses that part very well in his video and also a study about body temperature.

But as mentioned, the rod shaped structure on these tails is not related to feathers. It's related to tail shortening. The fact that it's found in feathered species is just a coincidence because those are also the ones that have evolved short tails. There are plenty of known species with long tail feathers that do not have the fused rod, including some oviraptorosaurs. There are also some species that have the rod shaped "pygostyle" that do not have particularly long tail feathers, including Beipiaosaurus and even many enantiornithines. So it's not directly associated with feathers.

Yes, some species that don't have it can have feathers, but those who have it, have feathers, haven't they? 

[Leyster]

[
Is it possible this effect would be specific to pennaceous feathers though, not to more primitive "dinofuzz"? If that is possible, is there reason to think ornithomimosaurs (or tyrannosaurs) had evolved the former rather than the latter?

No, since I explicitely mentioned a study made on emus, and ratites have reverted to simple feathers with no interlocking stuctures ("barbules"). Currently they're the closest we have to dinosaur feathers. Also there's currently no agreement about the nature of ornithomimosaur arm feathers.

[suspsy]

Me, I'm at the point of my life where I'm just fine with feathered or featherless renditions of T. rex. These arguments can be intellectually stimulating, but they always conclude the same with no one convinced otherwise. Although given that the T. rex in Eofauna's Theropods book is feathered, it's a reasonable assumption that the toy will be too.

I'm way more concerned about its stability. You should be too.

[Sim]

I'll leave also an article from 2015 (before the discover of the microscales on the underbody of Tyrannosaurus) on his blog discussing feathering in general, on the left there is an automatic translator option (where it says: (TRANSLATE THIS BLOG) that works pretty well:

http://palaeos-blog.blogspot.com/2015/02/las-plumas-del-dinosaurio.html#


It's a very good reading with lots of pictures and facts.

The scaly Tyrannosaurus skin doesn't appear to be from the underbody, in particular some patches are from the ilium which is the top of the pelvis.

Full body feathering is out , but scattered feathering in between scales, or feathering restricted to the dorsum are possible ( see PR.Bell.2017) as seen in Collecta 2018 and yes, Eofauna's most recent art. Infact we also have the what looks like plucked bird skin from Tyrannosaurus

Can you provide a photo of the "what looks like plucked bird skin from Tyrannosaurus"?  I've seen it mentioned a couple of times, but nothing else suggests it exists.

But the presence of feathers and scales isn't mutually exclusive, extant birds have scales on their feet, for instance. Juravenator is another example, this time, in a non-avian theropod.

Relatively recently the "scales" of Juravenator have been considered to actually represent remains of fat.

Pygostyle as seen in Deinocheirus and Oviraptorosaurs were not for feather attachment, but are designed to facilitate a vertical twitching movement. The only purpose to these would be for finer control of display structures on their tails, which would be feathers.

What is the source for their pygostyles being for a "vertical twitching movement"?  Beipiaosaurus has a pygostyle too and it doesn't have "display structures" on its tail.

[Concavenator]

I'm way more concerned about its stability. You should be too.

That's the real problem. Since I don't think they will include anything to ensure its stability like PNSO does, it pretty much comes down to luck. My Giga was able to stand for some time, but it can no longer stand. Other people say their own is able to stand. So it's a lottery. I imagine they will create a document like they did with the Giga to correct the position of the feet, but that's it.

I recently discovered that placing a coin under one of the figure's feet helps it to stand. In my case this has been succesful for not only the Eofauna Giganotosaurus, but also the Safari Allosaurus and the Vitae Tiantaiosaurus. So when/if the Tyrannosaurus starts falling down, I guess I will do the same.

[GojiraGuy1954]

Me, I'm at the point of my life where I'm just fine with feathered or featherless renditions of T. rex. These arguments can be intellectually stimulating, but they always conclude the same with no one convinced otherwise. Although given that the T. rex in Eofauna's Theropods book is feathered, it's a reasonable assumption that the toy will be too.

I'm way more concerned about its stability. You should be too.

My Giga has no stability issues

[Sim]

But as mentioned, the rod shaped structure on these tails is not related to feathers. It's related to tail shortening. The fact that it's found in feathered species is just a coincidence because those are also the ones that have evolved short tails. There are plenty of known species with long tail feathers that do not have the fused rod, including some oviraptorosaurs. There are also some species that have the rod shaped "pygostyle" that do not have particularly long tail feathers, including Beipiaosaurus and even many enantiornithines. So it's not directly associated with feathers.

Yes, some species that don't have it can have feathers, but those who have it, have feathers, haven't they? 

Not quite, some plesiosaurs have a pygostyle too and no-one is arguing they had feathers.

[
Is it possible this effect would be specific to pennaceous feathers though, not to more primitive "dinofuzz"? If that is possible, is there reason to think ornithomimosaurs (or tyrannosaurs) had evolved the former rather than the latter?

No, since I explicitely mentioned a study made on emus, and ratites have reverted to simple feathers with no interlocking stuctures ("barbules"). Currently they're the closest we have to dinosaur feathers. Also there's currently no agreement about the nature of ornithomimosaur arm feathers.

My understanding is the feathers of emus, as well as those of ratites in general, have a long rachis so they are still pennaceous feathers.  Non-avian dinosaur feathers come in many different kinds and the feathers of an emu are similar to some types of dinosaur feathers, but not all.  The extant bird feathers closest to ornithomimosaur and tyrannosauroid feathers are, I believe, down feathers.  In the comments of this blog post by Mark Witton, Matt Martyniuk argues that down and filamentous feathers would not function much different to hair: https://markwitton-com.blogspot.com/2017/06/revenge-of-scaly-tyrannosaurus.html

[Leyster]

[
Is it possible this effect would be specific to pennaceous feathers though, not to more primitive "dinofuzz"? If that is possible, is there reason to think ornithomimosaurs (or tyrannosaurs) had evolved the former rather than the latter?

No, since I explicitely mentioned a study made on emus, and ratites have reverted to simple feathers with no interlocking stuctures ("barbules"). Currently they're the closest we have to dinosaur feathers. Also there's currently no agreement about the nature of ornithomimosaur arm feathers.

My understanding is the feathers of emus, as well as those of ratites in general, have a long rachis so they are still pennaceous feathers.  Non-avian dinosaur feathers come in many different kinds and the feathers of an emu are similar to some types of dinosaur feathers, but not all.  The extant bird feathers closest to ornithomimosaur and tyrannosauroid feathers are, I believe, down feathers.  In the comments of this blog post by Mark Witton, Matt Martyniuk argues that down and filamentous feathers would not function much different to hair: https://markwitton-com.blogspot.com/2017/06/revenge-of-scaly-tyrannosaurus.html

According to Benton, 2019 Ornithomimosaurs have open pennaceous feathers without secondary branching. So as far as I understood they have a rachis but no barbules. Thus comparable with ratite feathers, which lack barbules too.

Also, here you can read some reasoning on feathering, expecially that feather mass varies isometrically with body size (so a taxon twice the mass of another has twice the feather mass), while the number of feathers grows more slowly
tl rl: on bigger animal feathers are sparser but bigger.
If you know who Cau is and how meticulous he is, if he choses to feather Deinocheirus he might have some reasons...

[Thialfi]

Just got this message from my local (Dutch) shop where I preordered both new EoFauna models:

"Eofauna has informed us that the new Konobelodon and Diplodocus figures
are being delivered later than planned because of transport problems.

The figures are expected to be delivered to us in approximately 4 weeks."

Not a problem for me and perfectly understandable. Can't wait though!

[ceratopsian]

A similar message about delay has come from Everything Dinosaur.

[suspsy]

Unfortunate, but hardly catastrophic. All good things come in time.

[ceratopsian]

Absolutely right.  Still something to look forward to in the near future.

Unfortunate, but hardly catastrophic. All good things come in time.

[suspsy]

Eofauna has posted a new image on Facebook.

https://www.facebook.com/482134425160798/posts/7852844614756372/

Looks like a T. rex figure is all but confirmed!

[Shane]

Me, I'm at the point of my life where I'm just fine with feathered or featherless renditions of T. rex. These arguments can be intellectually stimulating, but they always conclude the same with no one convinced otherwise. Although given that the T. rex in Eofauna's Theropods book is feathered, it's a reasonable assumption that the toy will be too.

I'm way more concerned about its stability. You should be too.

It's interesting to me that no matter what choice a figure makes in regards to Tyrannosaurus Rex (and other large tyrannosaurids) and feathers, someone will always claim it is "inaccurate" one way or the other.

I've seen people complain when figures of large tyrannosaurids are feathered, and I've seen people complain when figures of large tyrannosaurids are scaly.

It's to the point where a "partially feathered" representation feels less like an attempt at accuracy and more a way to placate the inevitable complainers.

Is there no room to still say "the jury is out"?

[Sim]

L @Leyster, where can I view Benton 2019?  I've not been able to find it.  Perhaps worth noting is that on the Ornithomimosauria Wikipedia page it says there is a debate on whether ornithomimosaurs possessed pennaceous feathers.

As for Cau, he's good but not infallible.  I've seen him make mistakes in the past.  His guide on feathering which you linked to looks good to me, although I doubt Deinocheirus had webbed hands and that feather arrangement.

[GojiraGuy1954]

[Faelrin]

I'd prefer a scaly (and/or lightly feathered) T. rex from Eofauna (and/or Safari Ltd) but that's only because I'm still rather satisfied with Safari Ltd's 2017 one as far as a heavily feathered (and bulky) Tyrannosaurus goes (no I haven't forgotten about the CollectA one either, but I don't have it). I do think the current evidence does lean more towards a (mostly) featherless T. rex but the door is still open, especially as we await for the Dueling Dinosaurs specimen to be prepared and published on someday, if not other specimens in the future. It's definitely not like its relative Yutyrannus or many other small theropods that have extensive integument preserved alongside it to work from yet (even better when in situ), also can't forget Carnotaurus either. At this point it may as well be an aesthetic preference, same goes for lips or lipless (though I do find lips more plausible and aesthetically pleasing, but my bias aside the point still stands).

[dinofelid]

In the comments of this blog post by Mark Witton, Matt Martyniuk argues that down and filamentous feathers would not function much different to hair: https://markwitton-com.blogspot.com/2017/06/revenge-of-scaly-tyrannosaurus.html

I see that in this post Witton comments about the paper linked earlier by L @Leyster which talks about the difference between emu feathers and kangaroo fur:

An oft-cited study in this regard is Dawson and Maloney (2004), who found emu feathers block virtually all solar radiation from the skin, preventing them from overheating in solar exposure that causes similarly-sized hairy mammals to seek shelter.

Feathers, however, are not magic structures that defy fundamental physical laws of insulation, nor do they liberate animals from the challenges of heat loss at reducing surface area:volume ratios. Beyond a certain size, shedding excess body heat is difficult for any terrestrial animal, and it gets tougher as they get larger. King and Farner (1961, p. 249) described feathers as having "an extremely high insulating value to the feathered surfaces" and a rich literature of studies on modern birds shows that feathers are as effective at trapping body heat as they are blocking solar rays (e.g. King and Farner 1961; Kahl 1963; Philips and Sandborn 1994; Dove et al. 2007). We can almost see them as a little too effective, leading many birds to develop heat-dumping adaptations to circumvent their own insulation, such as highly vascularised, non-feathery body parts as well as a repertoire of postures and behaviours (maximising exposure of unfeathered body parts; flapping wings; urinating on their legs) that aid cooling (e.g. Kahl 1963; Arad et al. 1989; Philips and Sandborn 1994). So yes, feathers are terrific at protecting birds from environmental heat, but that limits their ability to release metabolic heat from their own bodies.

I read over the Dawson and Maloney paper (you can download the full pdf at the link), and it looks like they are exclusively talking about emu feathers being better than fur at blocking radiative heating from direct sunlight, they don't consider other issues like ambient air temperature and heating from conduction/convection, or the way insulation slows down the shedding of body heat in hot weather. So the paper shouldn't be taken as saying that emu feathers make them even better at staying cool in hot weather than a hypothetical featherless emu would be in the same weather.