For Christmas, I got a variety of great zoology and paleontology books, but probably one of the best that I got is Dinosaurs: How They Lived And Evolved,
by Darren Naish and Paul Barrett. I sat down yesterday intending to
only read the first chapter or so, and ended up reading more than half
of the book.
First
of all, I've got to comment on the front cover. It's a great example of
why the saying, 'don't judge a book by its cover' is absolutely true!
Anyway, it doesn't really matter because the contents of the book itself
far make up for the Giganotosaurus on the front.
The
first chapter is a good introduction, covering subjects such as the
history of non-avian dinosaur discoveries and what their Mesozoic world
was like. I particularly enjoyed the small section on the climate of
Triassic Pangaea, the super continent that would have been mostly
covered in desert. It made me think of how the organisms that lived in
these conditions must have been well-adapted to the arid climate, so
various fun speculations could be made on how they dealt with desert
life.
The
information in the boxes explains things such as geological timescale,
and terms such as phylogenetic bracketing, etc. This brings me to the
text style in general, which I found very enjoyable. It isn't written in
a childish manner, far from it, but neither is it too complex for
someone like me to fully understand. Nor is it bogged down in too much
scientific jargon that it becomes weary to read, but the whole book
still feels very professional. It could be read by a
paleontologically-minded teenager like me, or an experienced
paleontologist.
The
second chapter covers the dinosaur family tree, discussing each main
group and their defining features. The cladograms are quite enjoyable,
with little pictures of the different groups. There's lots of up-to-date
artwork, which helps to break up the text and makes the whole book even
more interesting.
The
next chapter was about anatomy of non-avian dinosaurs, first talking
about bones, then muscles, and other subjects such as respiration and
digestion. The chapter concluded with an interesting outline of dinosaur
life appearance, and I was happy to see subjects such as dinosaur lips
and melanosomes in there.
The
next chapter is probably my favourite, and of the most interest to me:
biology, ecology, and behaviour. I've got to admit, I got a bit excited
when I was reading this bit. There's so much great information gathered
in one place! First of all, dinosaur diet and feeding behaviour was
discussed. There's a lot of good information on what we can tell from
the teeth, both from the shape and appearance of them, but also from
microwear. Its a good place to start to build up on my ideas on sauropod
and theropod niche partitioning.
There's
a surprisingly lengthy senction detailing non-avian dinosaur stomach
contents and coprolites. I was particularly interested to hear about the
wood found inside coprolites produced by Maiasaura. It makes me wonder if this was a regular food source, or one only used in particularly hard times.
There's a large part of the chapter explaining various modes of dinosaur locomotion, from walking to swimming and gliding.
The
next part that was of particular interest to me talked about parental
care and babies. Nests are discussed, as is the fascinating topic of
juvenile-only groups. The idea of the juveniles and adults holding
different niches is an interesting one, and I suppose it might have been
widespread in some groups, such as sauropods. The shorter babies would
probably have been feeding on a completely different food source from
the longer-necked adults.
A
section on non-avian dinosaur communities concluded that particular
chapter, discussing topics such as niche partitioning. Reconstructing
these Mesozoic ecosystems is probably the most interesting
paleontological subject for me, imagining these long-lost worlds in
life, how the different animals interacted with each other. Interesting
behaviours can be seen in modern-day animals like the hierachy between
vulture species at a carcass, and symbiosis between 2 organisms, but
sadly we'll never really be able to know about such things occurring in
prehistoric creatures. Though that does of course give you plenty of
room to speculate . . .
The
penultimate chapter discusses the origin of birds, then moves onto the
final chapter, titled 'the great extinction and beyond'. Unlike most
dinosaur books, it does not simply explain the extinction event that
wiped out the non-avian species, but then continues to discuss the
dinosaurs that didn't go extinct: birds.
Overall,
I was really impressed by this book. It was well set-out, easy to read,
professional, and covered the majority of paleontological subjects
surrounding non-avian dinosaurs. I would recommend it to anybody who has
an interest in paleontology, whether they're a beginner or a
fully-fledged paleontologist.
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