New dinosaur discovered!

the name? Laquintasaura venezuelae. A small Ornithiscian measuring roughly two meters and not quite so tipping the scales at 150-200 lbs. What's more, four of these turkey sized animals were found in close proximity to each other, suggesting at communal living.

A very early dinosaur, this find is intriguing because it gives us a certain insight into dinosaur evolution. The area the fossils were recovered in the La Quinta geological formation in the Venezuelan Andes, an area previously thought to have been far too inhospitable for dinosaurs.

“The fact that it is from a completely new and early taxon means we can fill in some of the gaps in our understanding of when different groups of dinosaurs evolved.” said  Paul Barrett, a palaeontologist at the Natural History Museum in London.

“Not only does it expand the distribution of early dinosaurs, its age makes it important for understanding their early evolution and behaviour.”

Laquintasaura is a suprising find, as it shows that the dinosaurs made a forceful comeback after the the Triassic extinction event.

At least half of the species now known to have been living on Earth at that time went extinct. This event vacated terrestrial ecological niches, allowing the dinosaurs to assume the dominant roles in the Jurassic.

The early history of bird-hipped, beaked, plant-eating dinosaurs called Ornithischia, of which the newly-discovered lizard is a very old example, has thus far been sketchy, as so few have been found.

Ornithischia gave rise to famous beasts like Iguanodon, Stegosaurus and Triceratops, which we all know and love, and have since we were young. 

Dinosaurs were facing extinction as soon as the plodded on this little blue planet..but..

As Jeff Goldblum so famously put it:

"Life finds a way"