Dinosaurs

Dinosaurs

By Moana and Langiola

Palaeontologists

Paleontologists are people that studies on dinosaurs.

Mary Anning was born in 1799 and found a plesiosaur

fossil that was almost complete and in 1828 she found

a pterosaur fossil she found it in Lyme Regis and found

some in England, in 1829 Mary discovers the fossil of an

extinct fish called a squaloraja and in 1847 Mary Anning

died because she had cancer. Joan Wiffen was born in 4

of Feb 1922 and she found the first dinosaur in New

Zealand then she found a small bone in Mangahouanga

Stream, a few days later Dr Ralph confirmed in 1980

that  she had found a tailbone from a theropod then

Joan made many more amazing discoveries over the

following years. Richard Owen was born in 20 of July

1804 and he is married to Caroline Amelia and they

had 1 son named William Owen, Richard Owen discovered

a Fossil Animal and he died in 18 December 1892.

Fossils

Fossils are dead animals or plants. They are usually skeletons

found embedded in rock. Sometimes fossils are footprints or poo.

Small animals or insects get stuck in tree sap which hardens and

traps them forever. Large animals can get trapped in ice or their

carcass gets trapped in layers of rocks. Over thousands of years

pressure builds up and the ground. Next the mould left is filled
with minerals that form rock. This rock shape is the fossil - an exact

replica of the dinosaurs. This process takes 10,000 years.

Palaeontologists find fossils when the top layer of dirt of

all rock washes all away. 

Age Of Dinosaurs

The Mesozoic Era is also known as the Age of Dinosaurs,

this is when dinosaurs lived. The Age of Dinosaurs is made up of 3

time periods. Triassic Period (251-200 million years ago),

Jurassic Period (200-146 million years ago), Cretaceous

Period (146-65 million years ago). 200 mya: Small mammals

appear. 150 mya: Birds evolve from dinosaurs. 140 mya:

First flowering plants appear, 130 mya: First snakes evolve

from lizards and 65 mya: Dinosaurs die out.

What were dinosaurs like?

Some dinosaurs stand on 2 feet and some stand on 4 feet.

These are the 4 types of dinosaurs Theropod, Sauropod,

Thyreophorid, and Cerapod. Some dinosaurs are a carnivore

eater and some are a herbivore eater but some dinosaurs

are an omnivore eater. Some dinosaurs are birds means

Avian but some dinosaurs are not birds means Non Avian.

Dinosaurs can run fast but some can’t run. Some dinosaurs

had slow metabolisms which means they could only walk slowly

as they didn’t have a lot of energy. Some had a fast metabolism

so they had a lot of energy to run fast. Metabolism means the

way your body converts food to energy. Dinosaurs have a hole

at the back of their eye but reptiles don’t have a hole at the

back of their eye and reptiles are warm-blooded.

Warm-blooded means when

your blood temperature always stays the same. Some

Dinosaurs live with a family like the theropods and dinosaurs lay eggs.

Extinction Event

66 million years ago, there was an extinction event which killed
all the dinosaurs. 

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Age of Mammals

Cenozoic Era is also known as the Age of Mammals. It is made of
3 time periods. Paleogene Period (65-23 Mya), Neogene period (23-2.6 Mya)
and Quaternary Period (2.6-0 Mya). During the paleogene period, large
mammals appear, including horses and camels. During the Neogene period,
Hominins (the ancestors of humans) begin to walk on two legs. During the
Quaternary Period Modern humans evolved.