Keiron Pim - Dinosaurs: The Grand Tour: Everything Worth Knowing About Dinosaurs from Aardonyx to Zuniceratops

1. The PermianTriassic extinction event, aka the Great Dying, that paved the way for the dinosaurs emergence occurred how many million years ago?
2. Why was Lessemsaurus back unusual compared with most Triassic dinosaurs?
3. Which is the earliest dinosaur known to have spent all its time on all fours?
4. What are the names of the two main orders of dinosaurs?
5. Which carnivore discovered in 2011 has a name meaning buck-toothed?
6. Pantydraco takes its name from a village in which country?
7. What is the proper name of the Triassic herbivore known as the Bristol dinosaur?
8. Leptosuchus looked like a giant crocodile but bore no relation to modern crocodilians. To which group of reptiles did it belong?
9. What term describes the process by which unrelated animals separately develop a similar appearance?
10. Which non-flying animal from 270mya in the Permian age is considered a possible ancestor of the pterosaurs?

See here for the .

1. The great landmass known as Pangaea split into two supercontinents in the Early Jurassic, one to the north and the other to the south. What were their names?
2. Why are fossils of sauropods skulls so seldom found?
3. In 1824 William Buckland made the first scientific description of a dinosaur. What name did he give it?
4. When Richard Owen coined the word dinosaur in 1842, which three genera did he describe?
5. Australovenator, Austrosaurus and Ozraptor were all discovered in which country?
6. What feature made Spinophorosaurus and Shunosaurus tails different from any other known sauropods?
7. The Bone Wars in late 19th-century America were a feud between which two rival palaeontologists?
8. Why was Gasosaurus so-called after it was discovered in China?
9. Palaeontologist John Ostroms study of which dinosaur caused him to propose an evolutionary link between theropods and modern birds?
10. The sauropod once termed Brachiosaurus brancai is now known by which name?
11. Why did Brontosaurus become known as Apatosaurus?
12. How old was Mary Anning when she found her first complete ichthyosaur fossil?
13. Fossils left when an animal was alive rather than dead e.g. footprints, eggs and coprolites are known by what term?
14. Who gave the famous Diplodocus skeleton to the Natural History Museum, and in which year?
15. How is the sea creature dubbed Predator X now more properly known?

See here for the .

Each dinosaur in this book is accompanied by a list of symbols to help you quickly understand its characteristics.

The dinosaurs estimated length from head to tail.

The period when the dinosaur lived, e.g. Jurassic, the epoch within that period, e.g Late Jurassic, and the age within that epoch, e.g. Kimmeridgian. Each age itself represents several million years, and the corresponding rock layer is called a stage. Most are named after places where rocks from those times were found, e.g. the village of Kimmeridge in Dorset, or Pliensbach in Germany.

How many million years ago (mya) the dinosaur lived. Where very long timespans are given e.g. 215200mya this refers to the approximate age of the rocks containing the fossils, rather than how long the species existed.

Whether the dinosaur was carnivorous (eating meat), herbivorous (eating plants), omnivorous (eating meat and plants), insectivorous (eating insects) or piscivorous (eating fish).

The dinosaurs estimated weight in metric and imperial measurements. A metric tonne is 1000kg, so a 50,000kg sauropod was 50 tonnes (49.2 imperial tons).

Where the dinosaurs fossils were found in modern-day countries. See to learn more about how our continents have shifted and changed over time.

1. What is the meaning of the word Cretaceous?
2. Which two dinosaurs have the shortest names?
3. Which is the biggest feathered dinosaur known, and how long was it?
4. What are the so-called raptors more properly called?
5. Who named Iguanodon after the discovery of a few fossilised teeth in a Sussex forest?
6. Which sauropod had a row of tall, forked spines along its back?
7. Baryonyxs discovery in Britain shed light on the true appearance of which huge carnivorous dinosaur?
8. Which sauropod named by Edward Drinker Cope from a single leg bone may have been 60m (200ft) long, making it by far the biggest dinosaur ever known?
9. How many melanosomes (pigment cells) could fit across a human hair?
10. Why was Irritator given its name?
11. Why was the therizinosaurs diet unusual among theropods?
12. How are the bone-headed dinosaurs more properly known?
13. Which dinosaurs fossilised skulls may have prompted people to imagine the mythological creature known as the griffin?
14. Which is the only one-fingered dinosaur so far discovered?
15. Which dinosaur is considered to have been the most intelligent?
16. During the Cretaceous an inland sea split North America in two. What is it known as?
17. And what are the western and eastern landmasses either side of it called?
18. Which is the first dinosaur to have gone into space?
19. How fast could Dromiceiomimus run?
20. Which dinosaur from Madagascar is the only one definitely known to have been a cannibal?
21. Which sauropod had a neck twice the length of its body?
22. What does palaeontologist Jack Horner think connects Dracorex, Stygimoloch and Pachycephalosaurus?
23. The longest dinosaur name is possessed by one of the smallest-sized genera which is it?
24. What age could Tyrannosaurus live until and what percentage actually reached this age?
25. The mammal Repenomamus is known to have eaten which genus of dinosaur?

See here for the .

DINOSAURS THE GRAND TOUR: Everything Worth Knowing About Dinosaurs from Aardonyx to Zuniceratops

Copyright Keiron Pim, 2013
The Experiment, 2014
Illustrations Fabio Pastori, 2013

First published in Great Britain as