dinosaurs and more galore

He may be small, but this young T. Rex is no pushover. More of a push-that-pesky-dakotaraptor-over. Quit following me!

Zhongjianosaurus yangi, the stilt-legged microraptorine from China.

Read more at Earth Archives

Happy Valentine’s Day from the staff (and animals) here at Huxley! Our park is an excellent place to take a date, and if you do so today, check out our Great Auks. These lovebirds are perfect for Valentine’s day, with their faintly rosy cheeks and greetings in which their heads make an adorable heart together! We currently have an ongoing breeding program for them, so sometime you may see some cute fluffy Auk babies to amp up the cuteness on future dates.

Keep the world a lovely place! Love,

The Huxley Staff

About the Individual(s)

Birthdate: 22 November 2016

Atrox and Sabor, two of the zoo’s newest arrivals, are a pair of North American cave lion (Panthera leo atrox) cubs. The siblings were born to a surrogate mother African lioness who, due to the cubs’ large size, had trouble birthing them naturally and so a cesarean section had to be performed. Due to this complication the mother rejected the cubs, this of course meant they must be hand reared and as the resident Big Cat Specialist and Head Big Cat Keeper the responsibility was mine.

At just about two months old now, Atrox and Sabor are almost ready to start trying meat, though they still won’t be completely weaned until they’re around six months old. For the time being they’re still totally on the bottle. Atrox, the tawnier of the two, is the male. He’s slightly bigger than his sister, though it’s not quite noticeable at this age, and is the more reserved of the two. Sabor, the lighter colored female, is more rambunctious than her brother and has been since birth.

About the Species

North American cave lions, also known as American lions, are the largest cat species known to date. The North American relatives of the Eurasian cave lion (Panthera leo spelaea), these cats roamed the Earth naturally until the end of the Pleistocene epoch. Standing over 3 feet at the shoulder and weighing up to 800lbs these cats were apex predators, preying on anything from deer, bison, young mammoths to ancient man. It’s still speculated as to whether or not North American cave lions lived in prides, the way their modern day relatives do. However we do know, thanks to cave paintings, that male cave lions lacked the large manes modern lions sport.

Location at the Zoo

There was no way to make this a nice Tumblr Post, so have a Google Doc. 

This has a bunch of Palaeoblr blogs, including just casual fans/observers. There is NO RULE for being a part of Palaeoblr, you just have to love paleontology, prehistoric life, and living things in general. So if you’d like for me to add your URL, let me know. If you’d like me to add additional URLs you have that aren’t on the list, let me know. If you’d like me to modify your “speciality” (which is… informal at this point), let me know. 

“All major theme parks have delays. When they opened Disneyland in 1956, nothing worked!”

“Yeah. But John, if the Pirates of the Caribbean breaks down, the pirates don’t eat the tourists!”

We haven’t been open a week and we’ve already had to stop foot traffic to a major park attraction to clean up our mess. Pleistocene Plains, and the remainder of our Cenozoic stock, should theoretically be the easiest to care for. They have the most living relatives, their DNA is derived from purer (and far more recent!) sources, and said DNA sequences need the least modification to produce an animal able to exist in the modern climate, atmosphere, etc. However, with all of our care and all of our attention to detail, we’ve had to temporarily close Pleistocene Plains because of one variable we had yet to take into account:

People.

So far only a few animals have been found to have definitely been nibbling at the garbage. Luckily, many prefer their nutritional diets we supply for them over some little kid’s candy wrapper, but they do get curious, and the sugar content in a chocolate bar is super enticing for them. In the wild, and millions of years ago, the processed sugar we take for granted just didn’t exist. Natural sweetness comes from natural sugars in fruits, which is good because fruits offer other specific nutritional benefits. If the fruit didn’t taste good, animals wouldn’t eat it, and they wouldn’t get those essential nutrients like vitamins! But fruit sugar is comparatively minimal, and you can imagine animals’ excitement at a wad of cotton candy that flew into their exhibit.

Carlos, a Megacamelus merriami, really likes food. He was treated for eating a few different human-intended foods (discarded soft pretzels, candy, etc. Seriously people, just eat your pretzel! Or throw it in the garbage! You paid a good… what do they cost again? We get staff discounts, haha. Whatever it was, you paid for it, now enjoy it!) and some plastic from wrappers and bags. Reusing plastic grocery bags to carry your park items is great, but it kind of defeats the purpose of being eco-friendly when it ends up in our Megacamel’s stomach. Plastic can do horrible things inside of an animal’s stomach. I won’t go into detail, but we essentially had to scan him and get the two wrappers and bits of a bag out by making him throw it up, routinely scanning for a few days to make sure it was all out and didn’t calcify. He’s been medicated, given some actual camel food, and he’s currently residing in one of our vet paddocks so we can monitor him closely. Poor Carlos. :(

Besides Carlos, a few Bison latifrons and Stockoceros have been reported to have gotten ahold of some human food, but they don’t see to be too upset. There’s no plastic or actual trash in their systems, which is good. The horses are still nervous around large groups of people, so they tend to stay away from the fence, where the majority of the litter is. We’re especially worried about them for fear of colic, so we’re keeping an eye out. Glyptotherium, Megalonyx, and our Teratornis individuals do not seem affected, yay! The Teratorns have their own inner, enclosed part of the Plains, so they don’t fly away. They’ve been kept in the further back section, which means people can’t see them as often for the time being, but they’re also safer from trash. This system was already in place so they could slowly get used to large crowds and noise. Megalonyx mostly eat from trees anyways, so they’re pretty safe - and of course we’ve observed and tested these animals to make sure they’re OK.

This doesn’t have to happen! PEOPLE! Pleaaaaaaaaaaassssssseeeee don’t litter. I beg you. I know it’s my job to help out animals when they’re sick, but that doesn’t mean I like seeing them sick! We do know, however, that of course not everyone means to throw trash around. But we’re implementing the Trash Watch, which is a fancy way of saying we’re making sure our maintenance, security, and entire staff are on the super lookout for litter- and litterers! You don’t want to be that person who has to get pulled aside and chided for dropping plastic. We’re all adults here, c’mon. In the future, our volunteers and interns will also have the task of watching for items which could potentially harm our animals and dirty our facilities. There’s always trash and recycling bins in sight, please use them - and a reminder that certain objects are prohibited, such as straws, because they pose a higher threat to our animals if they were to ingest them.

We’ll be checking some other exhibits, like the Vista View, routinely (by drone! How fun!) for trash so we can make sure our animals, staff, and guests are surrounded by a healthy environment. Our in-paddock security cams help, but the multitude of guests that come every day should be on the lookout as well.

Thanks so much and don’t litter,

Anastasia Falconer

Max ( @plokool ) and I went to the Museum of Science and Industry today, but alas, I didn’t get a good enough pic of myself with the baby chicks, so here is us at our apartment with Rey

Hello! Welcome, one and all, to the Thomas Henry Huxley Paleozoological Gardens’ official blog! Here’s how it will work:

This is a place where we, a few select staff at Huxley, update the public about the happenings at our park. We will make 2 or 3 large, professional posts a week, as well as smaller, more personal posts directly from our staff documenting experiences, answering questions, and more. We welcome any and all questions about our park and will answer them when we can! We have a team of experts at our discretion who have been here working on this project for months. Coming up soon, we will showcase our very first Animal of the Week! In which we will showcase one individual animal in our zoo that has captured the hearts of both its keepers and our guests– and we are open to suggestions about which animal to showcase! In the running this week are:

-Kirk, our young and shy Pachycephalosaurus

-Ol’ Sam, our grumpy Deinocheirus

-Blackbeard, our first ever created Mesozoic dinosaur, a Suchomimus

-Lazarus, our first ever creation, a Dodo

You can vote for an animal by simply replying its name to this post! Votes will be due on Tuesday, January 3rd, 7:00 pm American Pacific Time (1 PM Australian Eastern). Post will be uploaded on Wednesday the 4th.

On this day, January 1, 2017, we are proud to introduce the world to the Thomas H. Huxley Paleozoological Gardens. The culmination of many long years of hard work and cutting-edge science, this is the most innovative zoo on the planet. All of our animals are extinct! With state-of-the-art genetic technology, we have de-extincted many species and brought them to the modern world. We work with other members of the global de-extinction movement to reintroduce recently extinct animals to the world, and offer more distant de-extinctions a home here

Located on the eastern Australian coast, we are currently home to over 250 extinct species, from trilobites to terror birds to tyrannosaurs. The Huxley Paleozoo is dedicated to research, de-extinction, animal care, and education. Currently, the park looks a little something like this:

(Higher res here [x])

Luckily, you don’t have to be here to keep updated! We will be staying in touch online through this blog– ran by our staff– to share with you the wonders of our park, even if you are not fortunate enough to visit it in person. Feel free to ask us any questions you may have.

Welcome one, welcome all!

THE COLORING BOOK OF (SCIENTIFICALLY ACCURATE) DINOSAURS

IT IS SO GOOD

HERE ARE SOME OF MY COLORINGS SO FAR

EORAPTOR

MELANOROSAURUS

COELOPHYSIS

THERE’S FLUFF FAR AND WIDE

A DRAGON?!

THE POINTY BIRB

DUCK SATAN!!!!!

MODERN DINOSAURS ALONGSIDE EXTINCT ONES

KULINDADROMEUS?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IT’S ONLY NINE USD EVERYONE BUY THIS BOOK BUY IT BUY IT BUY IT I DON’T EVEN KNOW THE AUTHOR BUT HOLY SHIT

Happy New Year, Happy Chanukah, and Happy Kwanzaa,