Here’s the penultimate Jurassic June entry, Jurassic World’s Mosasaurus.
I wasn’t able to find a lot of complete baby mosasaur remains online to base this one off of, so I made the silhouette a bit closer to a real Mosasaurus, along with incorporating some juvenile crocodile and komodo dragon. Including having a stand-out color scheme. Baby komodo dragons/monitor lizards (a close relative to ol Mosa) are seriously pretty. Enjoy!
I liked playing JP:TG even if the gameplay was nothing too special. The lore and new dinosaurs were neat though it sometimes conflicted with the canon.
The new dinos in particular were really cool in concept but sometimes a bit lacking in concept. Like I don’t like the squiggly mouth on the Tylosaurus and the “dragon belly” on the Herrerasaurus, but that’s just me.
Finally, it’s done! Dinovember Day 30. The conclusion to my take on the Dinovember Powerball challenge! Again, sorry that this one is late. It took a while get finished, and even longer to scan correctly.
The Clash of Kings: ATyrannosaurus rex has pull down a juvenile Alamosaurus,only to be confronted by a hungry Mosasaurus hoffmanni. The two giant predators snarl, hiss and flash their teeth at one another, trying to intimidate one another. Using its fins, the Mosasaurus attempts to clamber onto the shore in order to take the carcass. In response, the T.rex snaps its huge jaws and kicks at its opponent with its great talons. The T.rex will defend its kill fiercely, though the Mosasaurus will not give up so easily either.
I figured I’d end this month on a high note. And since the final day of the challenge called for a dinosaur interacting with a non-dinosaur, I figured I’d cap it all off with a scene featuring my favorite dinosaur and my favorite marine reptile. Considering that there is some evidence to suggest that large mosasaurs lived near the Hell Creek formation, where T.rex roamed, it’s possible that there might have been some interaction between these two animals. They were in all likely-hood very rare, but still it may have happened.
Finally! Dinovember, day 30! A megalneusaurus takes a colossal chomp at a little tatenectes.
I’ve taken part in Dinovember three times now (skipping 2020), and the first two times, I wasn’t able to complete the month, mostly due to family issues that cropped up at the end of November. Don’t get me wrong, I did a LOT. I made my niece two coloring books to help keep her interest in dinosaurs alive, and she still uses them. And like, 55 drawings, nothing to sneeze at! But this year, I did it! I finished all of them! And it’s my best year yet. I learned a lot, and I think personally that I have greatly improved from what I had done before. I’m very happy with this years Dinovember. Hope my niece enjoys her newest coloring book! Time to assemble it
EDIT, 1/11/22: This entire Dinovember series has been compiled and is now available for purchase on Gumroad! The pages can be printed, or thrown into a digital program! Check it out HERE!
This is a 9.5" mosasaur (Prognathodon) jaw section from near Khouribga Morocco. It is in very nice condition still has four of it’s original teeth still in place. One tooth has a repair near the tip and there are a few repairs to the bone with gap fills but there has been no compositing done to this piece.
Mosasaurus were predatory marine lizards that reached very large sizes. The coloration on this one is inspired by the reconstruction featured on Prehistoric Planet, of course.
Not a T. rex but a Sea rex! This is the skull of Prognathodon solvayi.
Flashback to the end of the Cretaceous, some 70 million years ago: when tyrannosaurs ruled the continents, gigantic predatory lizards dominated the warm seas. Prognathodon was one of them. This animal belonged to the mosasaur family.
This nice specimen is very Belgian: it was excavated in 1889 in Ciply near Mons (Hainaut) and described that same year by Belgian paleontologist Louis Dollo (who also studied our Bernissart Iguanodons!). As you can see the skull is very robust, with a long, flexible jaw and sharp teeth. Prognathodon surely had a powerful bite! Turtles, sharks, ammonites, … they all went down its throat!
Prognathodon solvayi was relatively small, barely reaching 5 meters in length, while other species potentially reached 10 metres and more. Mosasaurs in general had long hydrodynamic bodies, flippers for balance and a powerful tail for propulsion (an upside-down shark’s tail, with the fleshy upper lobe smaller than the lower). They were one of the greatest success stories of their time, and it took the mass extinction at the end of the Cretaceous – some 66 million years ago – to wipe them out completely.
This specimen is on display in our Mosasaur Hall. Another Belgian must-see is the near-complete 12.5-metre-long mosasaur skeleton (Hainosaurus bernardi) hanging from the ceiling.
