Amargasaurus -- Spikes or Sails?: YDAW Synapisode

www.patreon.com/YDAW -- Researchers took a close look at the structure of Amargasaurus' neck spines, and concluded that the recent spiky restoration is not as reasonable as sail(s). Let's talk about this!
Previous Amargasaurus episode here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/hoO7h3yHpNiFoa8
Check out our merch! ydawtheshop.etsy.com
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Contents:
0:00 New work on the neck spines
1:40 Correlates
4:20 (Re)modeling
7:45 Ligaments between spines
10:30 Might sails be better?
13:40 Conclusion
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Sources & Links:
That inflatable structures artwork:
PPaleoartist/status/1512048821416902658?s=20&t=VcKq7Ufmkf3oivkbl8Qb8Q
Witton on the subeject of horn sheath plasticity:
markwitton-com.blogspot.com/2017/11/can-we-predict-horn-shapes-of-fossil.html
SVPOW has a photo of the knobs on Dicraeosaurus:
svpow.com/2008/12/21/shedloads-of-awesome-part-3-dicraeosaurus/
Cerda, I. A., Novas, F. E., Carballido, J. L., & Salgado, L.
(2022)
Osteohistology of the hyperelongate hemispinous processes of Amargasaurus cazaui (Dinosauria: Sauropoda): Implications for soft tissue reconstruction and functional significance.
Journal of Anatomy 00: 1-15.
www.doi.org/10.1111/joa.13659
Gallina, P. A., Apesteguía, S., Canale, J. I., & Haluza, A.
(2019)
A new long-spined dinosaur from Patagonia sheds light on sauropod defense system.
Scientific Reports, 9 (1392), 1-10.
doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-37943-3
Johnson, K. L., Trim, M. W., Francis, D. K., Whittington, W. R., Miller, J. A., Bennett, C. E., & Horstemeyer, M. F.
(2017)
Moisture, anisotropy, stress state, and strain rate effects on bighorn sheep horn keratin mechanical properties.
Acta Biomaterialia, 48, 300-308.
doi.org/10.1016/j.actbio.2016.10.033
Schwarz, D., Frey, E., & Meyer, C. A.
(2007)
Pneumaticity and soft-tissue reconstructions in the neck of diplodocid and dicraeosaurid sauropods.
Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 52 (1), 2007: 167-188
www.app.pan.pl/article/item/app52-167.html
Wilson, J. P., Woodruff, D. C., Gardner, J. D., Flora, H. M., Horner, J. R., & Organ, C. L.
(2016)
Vertebral Adaptations to Large Body Size in Theropod Dinosaurs.
PLOS ONE, 11(7), e0158962.
doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0158962
Windholz, G. J., & Cerda, I. A.
(2021)
Paleohistology of two dicraeosaurid dinosaurs (Sauropoda; Diplodocoidea) from La Amarga Formation (Barremian-Aptian, Lower Cretaceous), Neuquén Basin, Argentina: Paleobiological implications.
Cretaceous Research, 128, 104965.
doi.org/10.1016/j.cretres.2021.104965

[@PaleoNerd1905]

One minor error I noticed, there actually is a theropod known from the La Amarga Formation, an abelisauroid by the name of Ligabueino. However it was too small to have hunted an adult Amargasaurus, and the large predators at the time probably were allosauroids like carcharodontosaurs, especially since Lajasvenator is known from a slightly older formation (the same formation as Pilmateuia in fact). Overall a very nice and informative video, keep up the good work!

[@zandergonzalez5190]

I agree

[@mb_allo-3023]

Idk What to say

[@lucasgaudio3720]

True dat

[@cryingboybs12]

Ligabueino is acctually a noasaurid

[@beastmaster0934]

@@cryingboybs12 Which are abelisauroids.

[@NinjaGidget]

"Sharpies fibers used to be called something else, but we can't have nice things." I'm dying! I love how subtle, yet nerd the salt is.

[@kaxybaxy4147]

the thing i love about this channel is how it doesn’t hold back with science terminology. i’m relatively new to taking a deeper dive into dinosaurs and while i don’t know all the terms i think i’m learning faster by having ‘big science words’ thrown at me and having to make an inference based on the surrounding words. feels almost like i’m learning to read again! keep up the great work as always.

[@shanerooney7288]

As you seem happy to learn all the big words, could you please explain to me "Claviculi de Gargliari" (3:49)

[@kevinlyfellow]

The thing I have taken away is how much we are still learning about dinosaurs! I love learning the latest science and talk to my kids about their toys

[@candiedragon]

@@shanerooney7288 Just in case you were serious... Google translate says it's Latin for "the studs of Gargliari". Steven says this was the old name used to describe the lines left by collagen fibers that had penetrated the bone. Google says that Gargliari was the namesake of the first person to describe these traces of fibers, Domenico Gargliari, back in the 1600s, until it was renamed to "Sharpey's fibers" by William Sharpey in the 1800s. Take that with a grain of salt, I will admit that I clicked the first thing that came up, which was wikipedia, but it took me less than 2 minutes to find this info.

[@DeianPeraltaRovira]

Marginocephali

[@esper6119]

yessss, exactly this

[@michaelsuddeth9562]

I'm an engineer and this ligament theory makes perfect sense. Evolution favors energy conservation, and holding up a massive neck and head takes a lot of energy. What better way to do that than by using ligaments? It's whole neck was a natural suspension bridge, allowing for easy grazing and not requiring much energy to hold its head at height.

[@sasooka5448]

'Claviculi de Gargliari' and 'but we cant have fun with anatomical names anymore' are funny. But whats even funnier is the straight face he makes while saying it.

[@jessicavanrijbroek8283]

I laughed out loud to this!

[@58209]

is that joke a reference to a specific incident? i don't understand it.

[@rikaboberts]

Man, I love Synapisodes. A deep dive into one specific topic, going into all the nitty-gritty and all the reasoning behind the various conclusions will never not be fascinating to me.

[@hurgcat]

I just love all YDAW content. Super underrated channel!

[@KhanMann66]

Surprise they still at 70k only. This is some top quality dinosaur content that isn’t clickbait.

[@AlexIsModded]

10:17 This will sound absolutely weird but if you do an entire video only on air sacks it will be the highlight of my life. Every time a biologist tries to argue that gigantic creatures in popular media can't exist realistically, I think about the speculation surrounding air sacks and how this allowed these animals to become so massive.

[@brettgabbitas1852]

What gigantic creatures are you refering to exactly?

[@pokoirlyase5931]

@@brettgabbitas1852 I am guessing Godzilla

[@brettgabbitas1852]

Giganitci creatures in popular media aren't realstic, they don't have to be because the normal, boring laws of physics don't apply to them. They are fantasies. Not realities. Just like how there is now sound in space, but all of the popular media says there is. No, the movies and show biz is wrong about space and they are wrong about giant monsters. But,that's ok, it doesn't need to be real, because it isn't and it is theatre.

[@doragonsureia7288]

@@brettgabbitas1852 I guess sauropods in general. I think they wouldn't be able to exist without something to make them lighter.

[@Andidejager.]

Talking about horns and spongey bones reminds me of something. In the second half of 2023, we found a baby Eland stumbling around, dying in the baking summer heat. So long story short, we ended up hand rearing her for a few months. Her horns were growing every day and something that really surprised me was that her horns were very spongey. They were also quite flakey itchy because she used to LOVE having her horns scratched❤ she’s back with the herd now and she’s still dependent on milk but she’s THRIVING so one of the mothers in the herd must be feeding her ❤️

[@snakewithapen5489]

Got distracted staring at the sad emptiness of Antarctica on the map in the background, which has now made me wish for a Cryolophosaurus episode lol

[@mikeschwartz1764]

Hey, Schwartz here. Haven't met this "et al" character you reference, but for what it's worth, I'm buying your approach. Kidding, of course. Loved the video, as usual.

[@Vesmir789]

Very interesting... and the fact that a thick sail may have provided as much of an obstacle to potential predators as a row of spines is a very good point. It would still be difficult for a large theropod to effectively bite at the neck if it had a large, fleshy, semi-flexible sail on top. Cool stuff!

[@darkonyx6995]

But how can it move it's neck tho? Also, didn't dinosaurs storaged fat on their backs instead?

[@EGarrett01]

Couldn't the T-Rex also bite the sail and use it to hold you though while (perhaps) pins you with its foot? We've seen that T-Rexes both tried to hold prey by their tails and would bite into Triceratop's head armor and use it to rip their necks open.

[@YourDinosaursAreWrong]

If you like our stuff, and would like to help us keep making it, please consider chipping in over at patreon.com/YDAW, or taking a look at our products at www.ydawtheshop.com, or by buying Steven a coffee at ko-fi.com/ydawtheshow . All proceeds go back into making the videos you see here!

[@R.M.A.2006]

I have a question, are the necks of sauropods thick and thick from below, as they appeared in the documentary Prehistoric Planet?

[@DryptosaurusDavid]

@@R.M.A.2006 most likely

[@OneTrueNobody]

The evolving understanding we have of what these animals were like is always so interesting.

[@NinaFelwitch]

Just in time for the Amargasaurus release in Path of Titans :D

[@tomkroebel4936]

Best in PoT is that they gave us both variants! :-)

[@zeekw4313]

The goober arrives

[@GoGojiraGo]

I'm hoping that Frontier gives us an alternate model of Amargasaurus that has the sails in Evolution 2.

[@C.c.c.c.c.c.c]

It has already been one year!?

[@ryansabin2618]

Do you know if anyone has looked into the ligament covered spines being used as a way to assist in pulling the head and neck up? With amargasaurus' neck posture, and the way the bones are being stretched and compressed, I'm curious if it could be a mechanism to make it so take some of the weight off of the neck muscles to hold its head over the ground like it does.

[@calliope5681]

my current favourite dinosaur survival game, path of titans, came out with a playable amargasaurus character this week! they added three variations of the theories surrounding the dorsal vertebrae, i.e. sails vs. spikes.

[@whoahanant]

Ah yes! I'm so excited to play it next week! (I'm out of town, left literally the day they dropped it oof).

[@FotakaTefa]

Amarga with a sail sometimes looks like a big carnivore from afar in the game, really spooky. Maybe its tall neck was a defence mechanism on its own haha

[@Jpteryx]

@@FotakaTefa That's really interesting! Maybe we should be depicting it with large eyespots on the sail!

[@queenthefangirl268]

imo the sail subspecies kinda looks like a cobra. It's cool, but i unfortunately don't play sail amarg. The sacrifice of bleed is too much for me :')

[@deaconvelos8352]

this is a severely under rated dino channel

[@BrianEnghArt]

Thank you for noting that paleontology often gets into "comparative anatomy telephone."🤣Such a perfect term for this tendency. Sometimes the metaphorical diplodocoid eats it's own tail when speculative anatomy inspires speculative behavior, then that speculative behavior leads us to imagine speculative environments & habitat preferences. Then, papers analyzing the numbers of when and where dinosaur specimens occur start inferring where habitats occur based on the speculative habitat preferences of "low browsers" vs "high browsers"...🤔 and thus a perfectly circular diplodocoid argument is formed!😵‍💫

[@HereticalKitsune]

"Amargasaurus is so odd" is one reason why I love it! (And Aurorus, the fossil Pokemon from Alola)

[@rumbleanime5167]

Actually it is from kalos

[@Solarn40]

As someone who used to be a total dinosaur nerd as a kid and had all the dinosaur books I could get my hands on, YDAW is always really interesting and informative for me. Not just about new developments since I stopped paying close attention to paleontology, but also about what those books, often working with decades-old information and ideas themselves, got wrong.

[@PPaleoartist]

hey thanks for the shout out! great video as always, i was wonderin when the amarga synapisode was gonna come out!

[@bl00sadr]

I just bought the Schleich Amargasaurus and I'm happy to see the design hasn't been discredited yet. I mean I love Schleich dinosaurs but they are never the most accurate rendition of anything...

[@Ring3R]

Acrocanthosaurus! It'd make for a great episode. It's the link between the allosauridae and carcharodontosauridae, nearly the size of T-Rex, specialized to kill sauropods, and there's a ton of great material on it, including footprints indicating an actual attack on an adult sauropod. It'd make for an awesome full ep.

[@Symphing12]

They just did Giganotosaurus, which is an Acrocanthosaurus relative, if you haven't seen it yet!

[@Eloraurora]

Hey, the sails are back! Really loving the eyespot visual.

[@cocomunches2796]

Babe, wake up new ydaw vid

[@macabrevoid]

Amargasaurus is one of my all time favorite prehistoric animals ever since I was a child, and it makes me so thrilled how mysterious and intresting the usage and look of its sails were. I’ve always liked to go the route of a sail-like structure with some portions of the spine sticking out for extra defense and intimidation. It’s such a bizarre animal and I do hope one day another specimen can be found to shine light on it! This video and the last really helped with learning more about it!

[@Slow_o.O]

Man, that gray in the temples looks great on you. Almost like Dr Strange. Love it! Content is always super funny and enlightening. Keep up the great work!

[@ZeFroz3n0ne907]

Been a sub for just about 2 years now! Love your videos! Started watching when I was getting chemo for stage 4 Non Hodgkin's lymphoma, now in remission, for 2 years now! Would watch your vids during or right after chemo after I got home, now my son is excited about dinosaurs thanks to you and your awesome crew! (From Dave and son from Alaska!)

[@MaryAnnNytowl]

Congrats on remission, and I hope it continues that way. 🙂

[@Ankylosaurus_mangiventris]

Holy shit new YDAW vid 😳

[@erikhamann]

Thats why it was forked. It had a sail on one side and horns on the other. 😅

[@DinoEsculturas]

Thanks for the update! I recently asked for in the previous video about Amargasaurus and I'm really pleased with your explanation. Great show BTW, I've watched several times most of the episodes

[@perspectivamesozoica]

Great, my day just got better 😁

[@ZaDussault]

Basilisc lizards have back and head sails, I wonder how their structure compare! The sailfish also have a massive one, but it lives underwater

[@KidarWolf]

The sailfish has cartilaginous structures supporting its dorsal sail, as it is an enlarged dorsal fin. I suspect any inference we could draw from the sailfish with regards to amargasaurus would not be of particular relevance as a result. It stands to reason that amargasaurus sails would be stiffer due to the spines being supported by bone rather than cartilage, meaning you're probably talking about a less dynamic structure. Even with the sail being supported by bone, something that is intriguing is that, in the sailfish, its sail appears to stabilize the head during pursuit of prey, reducing oscillations, which reduces the detectability of their bill for their prey. While in the case of sailfish, we're talking about carnivores (specifically piscivores), where amargasaurus is a herbivore, it could have had interesting implications regarding its ability to move quietly while submerged.

[@shanerooney7288]

Do fish even have necks? And, is the dorsal fin on the neck?

[@Kevin-hx2ky]

@@shanerooney7288 Fish don't have functional necks. At most it's just a hinge between the torso and the head.

[@tactile2878]

Such a great episode. I hope to eventually see a Synapisode about the new Spinosaurus information, since we’ve more or less found out what kind of a water monster it really is.

[@cristhianmlr]

Never thought I'd listen to Steven saying "horny", but here we are.

[@samwill7259]

One of those dinosaurs we should have gotten some Power Rangers or Super Sentai representation for like a decade or more ago. Think of the toys you could make!

[@KRJayster]

So I legitimately love that our understanding of spinosaurus has changed so much in recent years, that you can actually see portrayals of the dinosaur changing in Power Rangers. Like in one season, it is literally a retool T-Rex with a different head and a sale salmon, and then like five or six years later it is much closer to a quadruped and how we know it’s shaped. And also made from a Mosasaur which admittedly isn’t super accurate…

[@KRJayster]

*sail section. Not a sale salmon.

[@whoahanant]

Imma draw a power ranger with amarga inspiration

[@Cloudrunner62]

@@whoahanant I wanna see it

[@Joakim1400]

Great stuff as always

[@tomatosoup44]

I had kept up with the news around amargasaurus but I still learned something new from watching this

[@dk439911]

Yaaaaay a new video! Thank you! This channel makes me VERY happy.

[@carlday30]

I think Jurassic World: Dominion deserves a special series on YDAW

[@JV-fj7of]

I was wondering if you stopped making videos, glad you are still making them.

[@McChicken03]

I was legit going to request this for an episode, we have been blessed this fine day!

[@riablatterspiel7236]

Wow you explain everything so clearly and with so much detail! It is interessting but easy to understand in the same time!

[@ZeFroz3n0ne907]

I wonder if the neural spines worked in multiple ways, a fatty hump to store moisture and nutrients, a display to rivals, potential mates and a way to ward off predators and a way of thermal regulation? Like a mix of Bull moose, camel and spinosaurus/dimetrodon. The idea of an eye spot(s) and or stripes would startle a predator if it suddenly poked its head up over a tree, I'd run. Just a thought I had.

[@darkonyx6995]

Personally, i think a sail or keratin spikes ( perhaps even both ) are more likely than the hump theory, a hump would limit it's neck movement too much, and unlike mammals, dinosaurs didn't storaged fat on the front of their bodies, but rather, on their backs, also, Amargasaurus's spines are way too thin to suport a fat storage.

[@darkonyx6995]

Buuut, if you still want a dinosaur with a camel-like hump, Denocheirus and Concavenator are much more likely options, since they got thick neural spines to support fat, and those enlarged spines are localized on their backs :D

[@jorgerangel2390]

Your content is incredibly well made

[@Traido]

Yay!!!! have been waiting so long for a new episode ^^

[@timhyatt9185]

new episode!! >>grabs popcorn and settles in>>>

[@jessicavanrijbroek8283]

Magnificent! I look forward to all of your Synapisodes as they show how much the paleontological community revises their perception of these incredible animals. As a child of the 80's I'm amazed at how far dinosaur research has moved forwards and a lot of my more recent knowledge is thanks to your channel. Much love and keep digging!

[@thomass5782]

I'm learning so much biology terminology watching these and looking words up

[@JohnnyTyrant]

Never been this early before. Nice!

[@kuitaranheatmorus9932]

I really love this video now I must redo my Amargasaurus ,thx YDAW Also I wish y'all are having amazing day

[@MaryAnnNytowl]

I LOVE seeing all of the older episodes updated! Simply because we learn more all the time about these critters, there will always need to be updates. And that's a very good thing! I now have to go see if I've missed any others to this point. 🧐 Or even happened to miss leaving a like and comment, to feed that ever-voracious Almighty Algorithm: Algorithmasaurus! Thanks, YDAW, for all you do! ❤❤

[@daliborjovanovic510]

So Amargasaurus has joined the club of prehistoric animals that are victims of merry-go-round theories about their life appearance XD So for the indefinite future, if you want to do paleoart of Amargasaurus, whether you want to depict sails or spines is entirely up to your personal preference, because I don't see this debate being settled any time soon.

[@caruzo9631]

Can you do an episode commenting on the new Apple TV+ series „Prehistoric Planet“? 😄 The CGI is so good! I loved the Quetzalcoatlus especially. 😌

[@laurachapple6795]

I wondered if you were gonna do a mini-ep on this. Very interesting.

[@arcticdino1650]

Yay, a new Synapisode!

[@ryaquaza3offical]

I’m just waiting for another study or new specimen that will completely just confuse this situation even more. I can definitely see this being a Spinosaurus type situation with people going back and fore about it’s lifestyle, just with a neck rather than it’s complete ecology.

[@LC_NOoSE_IV]

Really wanna see an acrocanthosaurus vid, grew up admiring Fran aka NCSM 14345 back home everytime I went to the museum.

[@MinMaxist]

Very moist episode, nice work!

[@jakeplus10]

One of the coolest dino's I've learned about since becoming an adult.

[@weaselwolf]

"Horn Core" sounds like some kind of heavy metal/ska hybrid and I'm here for it. Jump jive and screamo

[@grahamcrackercrust8825]

Very cool episode for a very interesting study! Certainly better than trying to understand a paywalled study just by reading the abstract! Personally, I'm still not convinced by Cerda's work though. I'm still leaning towards keratin horn sheaths being more likely. The evidence of ontogenetic growth cycles in the neural spines is actually a great fit for the horn hypothesis. You mentioned Witton's post on how Triceratops horns deal with re-structuring keratin layers (which also mentions how the same processes are seen in mammal horn growth). In my opinion, this is pretty applicable to Amargasaurus considering that their spines are not curved so much as angled backwards. They're also very straight near the tips, which helps since Keratin horns start grow down from the tip as the horn lengthens, meaning minimal structural changes would need to take place between growth cycles in Amargasaurus especially if the bone itself is changing shape at the same time. (The bighorn sheep diagram on Witton's blog post explains this better than I can.) Meanwhile, assuming the proposed neck sail would be primarily for display, I would expect it to grow all in one go as the animal nears maturity which is different from the regular, cyclical growth stages typical of horns. Admittedly this is me speculating though. While it's true that the trend is to find sharpy's fibers on the left and right sides of the spines, it's worth noting that over half (7 of 13) of the samples were taken from either the bottom 1/3 of a neck spine or from a dorsal vertebrae. Both these sources could still support various tissues, ligaments, and/or skin (and thus show the observed trend) if keratin horn sheaths were only present on the top 2/3 of neck spines as was previously assumed. Other points about the sail I do agree with, however. The lack of grooves along the surface of the spines is particularly strong evidence against horn sheaths. And I had no idea that stress is directed onto the bone core when pressure is applied to the horn. Also! This is unrelated to the neck spines, but there are a few large theropod teeth from the La Amarga formation! There's only a throwaway mention of them in Apesteguía 2007, but they're noted as being similar to the teeth of Acrocanthosaurus. This nicely fits the characteristics of Tyrannotitan, a close relative of Acro known from a neighboring Argentinian province and dated to only 4-11 m.y. later. Whether it was Tyrannotitan itself or a close relative, something was filling the large predator niche there! Love you guys and love these videos!

[@blueffer]

OH MY GODDSS IVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS!!!!!!! YEAAAAAAAAA BABYHY

[@afa78djd]

My only issue it having a sail is, won't that stress its neck more due to wind resistance?

[@raiderxs1570]

was about to say I just rewatched the Amargasaurus 2020 with the release of Amarga in PoT. So do you guys play Path of Titan yourself? 😊

[@actual.lizard]

Obsessed with the eye spots

[@nullofthenull]

I love the end of the video animation

[@sshippeee]

YDAW is awesome because you have fun showing what's wrong with the popular depiction of dinos, and that shakes my preconceptions allowing me to imagine like a child discovering this subject for the first time. I love thinking what it would feel like to run my hand over this creature's sail while it still lived.

[@cinnamonsugarcourtney6073]

I was wondering when you would cover this :)

[@LordTrilobite]

Spinosaurus neural spines DO have very prominent ligament scars though. It's just localized near the base.

[@charlespogchamp1906]

Can you do a video revisiting spinosaurus?

[@profcraneporter]

Just a plethora of Amargasaurus content. Path of Titans, videos on Amaura from Pokémon and now this

[@AndriaTheKobold]

WOO NEW EPISODE

[@ismaybruneel1867]

love watching these dinosaur video's

[@whoahanant]

Amargasaurus is my #1 favorite herbivore so glad to see it here!

[@itsDJGreene]

I love this channel!

[@R.M.A.2006]

We want a video about the new Spinosaurus

[@Fed.E]

I wonder how much soft tissue Amargasaurus would have between left and right neural spines, specially at the upper part.

[@touhouandvocaloidfan8682]

Amargasaurus was add on the new map in the game ARK Survival Evolved and Now in the game Path of titans wich has the neck covered in spikes or with sails while in ark for pvp the amarga has 3 diffrent type of spikes he can throw off his neck and they regrew so it has fire spikes , ice spikes and armor piercing spikes i think ? Anyway its awesome to have so much for amarga in those games and i really feel like this year is great for this dinosaur :D !

[@Keigo_88]

Can you please do a video on Yutyrannus?

[@marcosfidelis4171]

Honestly, I think I like the airsack idea, because there's just so much space left between the spines, there has to be something there, otherwise amargasaurus just turns into an aqueduct and that's also something we don't see in today's nature.

[@snakewithapen5489]

I'm not sure what evidence if any we have for Amargasaurus skin, but if it's supposedly scaly, I can only imagine that having an 'aqueduct' channel on the neck would collect rain and foliage and could cause scale rot issues like seen in modern lizards. That's fully speculation since we don't really have any living animals with a structure like that, but I feel like if it has solid sails rather than spikes, with the two sides of the forked channel, it would reasonably be healthier for the animal to have some kind of structure in the middle to prevent the channel from collecting debris from their environment. (Since they're browsing with their head down in the brush)

[@ten-chan1015]

I do wonder with how thin those neck spine things are, if they would still be quite brittle? Like in the example where something might try to take a chomp out of that neck-sail thing, wouldn't that be like a pretty bad injury to sustain? Especially if that whole thing has a large role in the neck mobility of the dinosaur? Like, say it survived the initial attack, but with it's busted neck sail, can it still feed efficiently...? I'm by no means someone with deep knowledge of this, but that's just a thought that came to me while re-watching this episode.

[@daliborjovanovic510]

Supraspinous sounds like Spinosaurus' superhero alter ego.

[@Caennuck]

Not sure if this has been addressed, but would love to see an episode or series where you review dinosaur anatomy in popular dinosaur survival games. At least the ones that are trying for some semblance of realism (The Isle, Path of Titans, Prehistoric Kingdom etc.) as opposed to the intentionally cartoonish/monsterized ones like ARK or Jurassic World.

[@Nagari2637]

Amargus

[@blueffer]

Sus

[@RestorationAustralia]

Interesting fact finds. 👍

[@Eo_Tunun]

Nicely strechy springy ligaments acting on the spikes could have acted as a kind of metronom to define a prefered frequency at which the neck swings up and down. Synchronised with steps, this could have made a certain frequency of steps preferable by being less costly to the animal. This could be a means of maintaining a fast walking/running pace for longer periods, obviously helpful to escape predators that are not good at chasing their prey over long distances.

[@maozilla9149]

good show

[@BasiliskOnline]

"this might have bearing on bajadasaurus, those authors had looked at how when force is applied to a horns heath thats much longer than its core and when the horncore is curved, the force is transferred down into the center of the bone. And if the bajadasaurus internal structure of its neural spine was similar to amargasaurus that might be BAD..." I'm trying to determine which was I'm supposed to take this, is the thought that the recent research on Amargasaurus may not be applicable to Bajadasaurus?

[@terrytheinsane]

Spinosaurus: sauropod edition

[@Cloudrunner62]

I’d love you see you guys maybe take a video game like Jurassic Park: The Game, and critique all the designs while doing a play-through of it. That would be so much fun, I think. But I understand if that’s not really your thing.

[@Pzz5117]

I would love to see you cover acrocanthosaurus or utahraptor. You already covered spinosaurus and allosaurus my other favorite dinosaurs. If you need their toys I can get them for you.

[@nb_nb]

This is good! Have you ever considered doing a video on dimorphodon? I used to have a book of dinosaurs and the thing always looked so.... ugly. A giant shrinkwrapped head with tiny teeth and a tiny body, and i think that can't have been right.

[@noneofyourbuisness1679]

You mentioned that the spines (much like Spinosaurus' sail) were previously portrayed like a bats wing, with the individual bones visible through/alongside the membrane and that this no longer seems to be the case. Would a more accurate example be a dolphin or sharks fin? Like, there's bone/cartilage there, but from an outward appearance, it is simply a thin, smooth surface?

[@bellpebber63]

"Competitive anatomy telrphone" sounds like a fun game

[@husky6732]

I'd really love to see his opinion on Prehistoric planet

[@superdupergrover9857]

Obviously, it is neither. The coolest option is always correct. The coolest option is always laser beams.

[@justplainpsychotic]

That pronunciation was awesome and I could never attempt it.

[@GandalfTheTsaagan]

Could we compare it with Dimetrodon too? It also has thin, tall spines whose sail presence has been scrutinized recently

[@kevin-jd5rj]

what did you think of the inflatable sacs on titanosaurs in prehistoric planet? I immediately thought I'd like to hear your opinion. I know it's possible they used them for display...it honestly looked quite silly to me. I'm not saying they didn't have air sacs, which they did, but the display usage...