movie review: walking with dinosaurs

though almost nothing but disaster and tragedy has come in the wake of my cousin larry visiting me, one good thing has emerged from the whole affair...

larry being the biggest dinosaurian actor in hollywood (in modern times anyway), has the behind the scenes scoop on nearly every high profile dinosaur movie of the modern era. as larry loves talking about himself and his various exploits, during his recent dropping by i've gotten the low down and behind the scenes gossip on pretty much every film larry has ever been a part of!

perhaps the most dear to his heart were the BBC prehistoric series including such legendary documentaries as walking with: dinosaurs, beasts, and monsters. the chased by dinosaur series, sea monsters, and prehistoric park all with nigel marvin.

larry giving me stories about these shows coinsides quite nicely with my birthday present from craig all of them on DVD. so i shall impart on you an very insiders view into the production of these shows. starting at the very beginning...

Walking with Dinosaurs

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Summary of Review

(Remember this is all from a Dinosaur point of view)

Score: 120%

Good Points:

the LARGEST cast of dinosaurs EVER in one project!

unmatched accuracy and attention to scientific detail for its time

authentic casting

easily among the best dinosaur, and prehistory portrayals of all time!

Bad Points:

some out of date dinosaur behaviour included (but this was cutting edge in its time. so i'm cutting scales here as it were)

i wasn't in it!

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Plot Summary

not much of a specific plot in human terms of a movie due to NO humans appearing in the movie at all! instead near perfect portrayals of dinosaur existence before their various extinctions millions of years ago.

in dinosaur terms of plot though these 6 episodes have it all.

romance. nearly every episode has a storyline or plot thread related to love. these vary from the heart warming (the love affair of the diplodicus), to the comedic (the out of date loner tyrannosaur story), to the very tragic (the ornithocheirus' epic). to all you dinosaurs reading this walking with dinosaurs is a great date movie!

epic. the saga of especially the coelophysis comes to mind as they muscle their way into a none dinosaurian world.

comedy. the antics of the leaellynasaura had me laughing the whole time. their such cute little buggers.

horror. the last episode is full of scary menaces to us dinosaurs leading up to the final extinction 65 million years ago (i highly discourage hatchlings from being allowed to watch this episode). From egg eating mammals, to volcanic gas traps, to large crocodiles, to the asteroid impact. a very scary note to end the series on.

action. okay too many great action sequences to list. to the guys out there, this film has so many scenes of hunting, stalking, pouncing, and ambushing it'd make even the most scavengeristic theropod yearn for the hunt...

Production History

for these particular films to be fully appreciated their behind the scenes story must be known first. so for this review i diverge with this new category (due to a few of my later review aspects being kinda sparse).

like SO much in modern dinosaur culture this series owes a great deal to jurassic park. with the majority of us surviving dinosaurs being dependant on public interest in us (due to our only occupations being in museums, theme parks, and oh so few lucky of us as movie stars) jurassic park brought a whole new level of public interest back to dinsoaurs.

at the forefront of this wave of public interest, was the flagship dinosaur of the jurassic park franchise (at least in the 1990's), my cousin larry. now whatever differences me and larry have in real life (caused by his being a JERK and all!) i can't bad mouth his actions in the 1990's (partially cause i hadn't been discovered or hatched yet) as larry put a lot back into the dinosaur community with his stardom.

larry has always been a staunch believer and proponent for dinosaur rights and cultural identity. militantly so in fact. it isn't exactly a tightly held secret that larry hates humans, and sees them as taking from us a world that we rightful owed millions of years ago.

though his politics may be a bit controversial inside and outside the dinosaur community one thing is for sure, they compelled larry to seek the making of a remarkably unique series. emerging from jurassic park and jurassic park the lost world a tried, tested, and true hollywood star larry decided to push for a side project he'd envisioned while working in mainstream hollywood.

that of an accurate and factual version of dinosaur existence be told. one where humans weren't injected in as the heroes. one where our heritage and past could be explored in a truly dinosaurian way...

larry found no one interested in north america, but when word of his aspirations hit britain film makers the BBC pounced on the opportunity. backed by both larry and the BBC the beginnings of history were in the making.

it is interesting to see how these human co producers would effect production. on the one side larry's extreme pro dinosaurian views shine through, yet some of the human sensitivities and misconceptions disrupt larry's vision.

the most public of these are the jurassic episode and larry's own finale episode. the human producers saw the late jurassic period as the Utopian dinosaur era, and as of such the episode has a rather loving and optimistic approach in it's story telling. this differed from larry's viewpoint (and mine) that the late cretaceous was the pinnacle of dinosaur existence.

larry's wishes were mostly kept for the finale (in which he starred) to be of a tragic nature, and a moving and swaying testament to the end of the dinosaurs reign of the earth. however the british producers were so keen to catch the hype from jurassic park they insisted on incorrect tyrannosaur social behaviour like that from JP2 (mostly the t-rexs being loners when we were in fact packing animals). i'll talk about this later, but i mention it early so you follow my small brains logic throughout...

the series before it had even started had one star, but in order to bring the prehistoric past back to life larry and the BBC were going to have to assemble a massive cast... which launches us perfectly for a look at...

Dinosaur Celebrities and Stars

with a staggering 21 dinosaur species in the cast, and 16 other very extinct animal types in this series it was show casing nearly a quarter the surviving prehistoric animals who still dwell the earth today!

by this point in the late 90's dinosaurs were getting used to being in the public eye, and more and more obscure and less main stream species were making their way into films and movies. what made walking with dinosaurs so unique was the prehistoric none-dinosaur creatures it featured. suddenly opportunities for fame and exposure were opened up to these otherwise unnoticed minorities (a trend the british have pushed up into the present with shows like primeval).

i list all the various cast members by episode rather then importance just due to the sheer number.

first episode "new blood" set in the early days of the triassic. larry wanted to tell the story this seldomly talked about era of dinosaurian history (at least in pop culture). it presents the then current reptilian rulers of the earth in some of their glory, but they are also depicted as grossly out matched by the dinosaurian new comers (true they were out matched on a geologic timeframe, but larry's dinosaurian supremacy over plays this to seem like a single year of time)


Placerias among the last of the mammal like reptile get a big spot light in this episode representing the old guard rulers of the earth.


Coelophysis a commonly overlooked by hollywood, but very important early theropods who finally as of walking got the public attention they rightfully deserved! in real life they were played on screen by all the members of the only modern surviving pack of coelophysis left today. they work at several museums throughout the world, and this was a rare chance for them to all work together. this family reunion aspect and their being able to act out their culture and past these guys apparently had a lot of fun while filming, and it shows in the quality of this episode.


cynodont are the token mammal infusion into this episode. as mammals would become important later on in geologic time it's good to see their origins on screen. at the same time one can't help but smell the humans at the BBC insisting that the cynodont storyline be an important one in this first episode.


Postosuchus this proto t-rex was a must for the pilot episode. a close ancestor of us dinosaurs postosuchus is viewed as distant family by us theropods even if he ate our primative ancestors. larry specifically wanted them included in the series. out of both respect for another archosaurian top predator, but for the more humbling role of being shown subcoming to dinosaur supermacy.


Peteinosaurus was more then thrilled at presenting flying reptiles in a NONE hollywood manner. typically pterosaurs are portrayed as nothing more then flying man killers, and the oppurtunity to set the record straight was a real treat for all the pterosaurs of the walking with dinosaurs series.


Plateosaurus were the giants of their time, but due to hollywood typically not doing dinosaur period pieces (and if they do they always get it wrong!) prosauropods are always over shadowed by true sauropods in movies. walking was just what the prosauropods needed to show the world what they had!


the second installment "time of the titans" is the only uplifting and happy episode. which makes for a refreshing watch. the other episodes tend to overly hint at or outright speak of the impending doom of the eras and environments their about. this episode is a power house of mega dinosaur appearances. never before in history has so many HUGE dinos been in one film...

Brachiosaurus having broke out into films with jurassic park the largest of dinosaurs makes a short appearance in time of the titans. however due to the attention the first brachiosaurus scene of jurassic park received in 93 (that interest peeking in a oscar nomination) the brachiosaurs bought into their own new popularity a bit too much. when JP2 entered production these sauropods made too high a salary demand, and were written out of the movie and gained something of a bad name for themselves in the movie making biz. their reputation was still damaged as of the late 90's, and the BBC not wanting to be too associated with them, but still needing them to appear in the episode about large american dinosaurs offered brachiosaurus this grand and quite complimentary appearance, but only for a minute. a jesture that eventually would lead to brachiosaurs being cast in JP3

Diplodocus being among the longest of sauropods is no stranger to film, but hadn't appeared in anything for decades till walking with dinosaurs. in time of the titans they are THE titan. the shots of the diplodocus herd on the move became instant classics, and are among the most iconic of this whole series.

Stegosaurus after enjoying their trimphant come back to movies in the post-jurassic park movie era with a prominent appearance in JP2 the stegosaurs were given a very short but high profile appearance in walking with dinosaurs. much like the brachiosaurs the stegosaurs are given very high notice part, but very little screen time. rumour has it that larry didn't get along so well with these martial artists of the jurassic while filming JP2, and thus manipulated the BBC to keep the stegosaur moments to a minimum.

Dryosaurus being a hypsilophodon were among dinosaurs that could almost never hope to appear in a movie. however being a numerous, but yet somewhat low key, member of mesozoic ecosystems walking with opened up a whole new oppurtunity for the whole hypsilophodontid family to appear. this would cummulate to episode 5 centering around some of Dryosaurus' relatives from down under.

Ornitholestes the small ancestor of tyrannosaurs and raptors, for their introduction to show biz, is given a key role as the nemisis of the baby diplodocus in the early parts of this episode. larry is known to get along very well with these primitive members of our ceolorasaur family, and insisted they be given a big part in the series.

Allosaurus is one of the few lucky dinosaurs to appear in two of these episodes. not only time of the titans, but also the aussie episode. allosaurs are of course NO stranger to the big screen, and as of such have a strong voice in hollywood. one that even matches larry's which was how they negotiated so much time on the series (this was also helped by their family's living so long throughout geologic time!).

Anurognathus the tiny sauropod cleaning pterosaurs were a requirement in this episode as per contractual demands by the sauropod stars. the sauropods required the BBC to provide the Anurognathuses to keep them comfortable. it was an interesting time where the actors offstage requirements could be included in the movie to enhance the film. it also wasn't hard for the participants in these scenes to perform as this was natural behaviour for all involved. the producers of the series were so impressed by the Anurognathus that they were cast again in a solo role (removed from sauropods making it a very unrealistic portrayal) in primeval this year.

the third installment "cruel sea" is among my most favourite mesezoic shows of ALL time! i've always had a soft spot for marine reptiles. dating back to my days living in the tyrrell museum. i used to feed the mariners on display every night before i'd goto bed. they were so majestic. former rulers of the blue. i always wanted to see them alive (rather than the tyrrell's being nothing more than bones). this episode is the first time in decades that marine reptiles have been done well...

Ammonite the shelled cephalopod (squid/octopus relatives) make a brief, but important cameo in this episode. sadly only one LIVING ammonite is seen on screen, and that's at a distance. larry informed me these guys are very hard to direct for filming (maybe explaining their brief but equally disappointing appearance in primeval). this made for not as great an appearance of ammonites as should have been warranted. ammonites were as common as fish during this period of time, and though the episode acknowledges their importance it sweeps them under the rug quickly.

Cryptoclidus though not the most spectacular of long necked plesiosaurs was a good representative of this family. despite popular depictions of plesiosaurs, most of them had medium lengthed necks like cryptos. these guys had immense fun filming with the underwater acrobatics and maneuvers of their heritage.

Eustreptospondylus the token dinosaur in the episode is the first high profile appearance of a megalosaur on screen. this is odd as megalosaurs are the longest known dinosaur by humans yet they've never appeared in film before walking with.

Hybodus the odd jurassic shark became a fan favourite with their anvil shaped fin. so popular and memorable they were asked to return in chased by dinosaurs sea monsters one of the few sea creatures to get a double appearance.

Liopleurodon the short necked pliosaur behemoth of nightmares made a very trimphant debut into showbiz with the intro scene of snatching a dinosaur off the beach (this was a very tricky scene to film as only one tiny bit of beach was deep enough for the liopo to duck behind the rock, and that barely permitted the room for it to grab the dino and lunge back into the water convincingly). among the largest predators of all geologic time was also asked to return for chased by dinos sea monsters.

Ophthalmosaurus the star of the episode is yet another first time appearance. this of the whole ichythosaur family. amazing to think that the fish lizards had never appeared in anything before, but it's true. probably the speed that they move at, even while going slow, proved prohibitive of old era filming technology. walking with remedied this fortuently.

Rhamphorhynchus were the only verteran actor prehistorians in this episodes cast, and served a real leadership role to the others on what to do.

the fourth epsiode marked the beginning of the creteaceous episodes (which made up half the series) "giant of the skies" is a tragic tale chronicling the demise of a single male Ornithocheirus. through the narrative of his finale journey we fly from one end of the prehistoric earth to the other, and get a very indepth view of dinosaurian life of the mid creteaceous.

Ornithocheirus among the largest of winged reptiles is the star of this episode. like so many of the other animals in the walking with series this was a first time appearance for these guys. on the behind the scenes side this was a surprise move made by larry who spurred pteranodon in favour of a less known pterosaur, which allowed the showing of the igaunadon era of time.

Iguanodon was the first really famous dinosaur in human culture ever, and played a big part in the really important early dinosaur fiction the lost world, but yet hadn't appeared in a film till this point (being brushed off in the 1925 film based on the book for newly discovered north american dinosaurs). however after appearing in walking they were immediately cast for the modern HBO remake of the lost world (in my opinion the best film adaptation of it by far!).

Utahraptor the giant dromaeosaur made famous due to it's discovery around the release of jurassic park actually hadn't been in anything up till this point. typically tyrannosaurs and dromaeosaurs don't get along, but larry and the utahs developed a real friendship while filming walking with. i figure this is because dromaeosaurs evolved from big lugs like utahs and got smaller and more annouying throughout geologic time. the bigger theropod the less annouying is the common contention of us tyrannosaurs!

Polacanthus despite being the first known ankylosaur a century and a half ago these guys had, you guessed it been in nothing... It was fitting that they got to walk along side other old timer igunadon in all their scenes.

Tapejara the debut of these huge crested pterosaurs was a real victory for the pterosaur community who'd been calling for more exposure in films than pteranodon or dimorphodon. larry sensitive to their request made sure this episode satisfied this demand.

Iberomesornis larry is proud of tyrannosaurs being a direct relative of birds (a status no other large theropod can claim. the carnosaurs and spinosaurs are distantly related to birds, but we t-rexs as the giant ceolorasaurs are directly linked) and wanted an appearance of an early bird species. due to the prehistoric geographic locations picked for walking with this episode was the first oppurtunity to show case such a primative speicies.

the close to home episode of the series "spirits of the ice forest" is set next door to new zealand in prehistoric austrilia which during this time was attached to us and antarcticia. this episode is about the extreme adaptability of us dinosaurs, and our overcoming extreme environments with extremeness! This episode is poplulated with the biazarre and novel survivors of geologic times past. Due to the sever nature of the polar environment a number of animals that had gone extinct elsewhere, but had adjusted to the colder climate, survived down under. as of such this episode features a very unique cast:

Koolasuchus the giant amphiban equivilant of a crocidile, surprisingly was not a new comer to film. in the old era movies at the earth's core and the people that time forgot both featured a koolasuchus. in this movie they were depictated as the water dwelling animals they were.

Leaellynasaura are the only hypsilophodon in history that will probably be the star of a dinosaur movie. Their funny and cute antics are very memorable, and lend well to exploring the strange south polar world of the cretaceous.

Muttaburrasaurus the rather large igunadontid are the true sterotypically aussies (their dinosaurian accents are even austrilian!) and give the episode that true down under flavour.

weta were once a wide spread species throughout the world, but now are extinct everywhere but new zealand! i'm going to have to find me one to see here in the present!

tuatara are a species of reptile that is inbetween lizards and snakes. in other words it is a common ancestor for most modern reptiles. virtually unchanged in 220 million years (but still a little different mind you!) these guys still again are around in isolated new zealand. again another something i have to find here!

finally the end of the series "death of a dynasty". the big end of cretaceous piece, and larry's most passionate performance ever (at least till prehistoric park). this episode captures my species past and heritage well. the only problems are the glaring mistakes of tyrannosaur behaviour, and it is a little different being that i'm an albertan t-rex not a montana one (same with larry for that matter).

Anatotitan the massive non decorated duckbill. very surprising that these guys or their ubber closely related relatives the albertan edmontosaur haven't been in films before. edmontosaurs are by far the most common dinosaur you find around drumheller. you'd think they'd come cheap for anything as a result!

Ankylosaurus the tankosaur, and t-rex nightmare (this episodes climax shows exactly why!) surprisingly had no roles previous to this. being one of the most iconic and popular of plant eating dinosaurs this is interesting. showing this popularity after this appearance the snap desecion was made to get these guys in JP3, even if it was a bumged up appearance it shows how these guys can easily sell themselves and dinosaurs in hollywood!

Deinosuchus the colossal crocidile makes a very short and unexciting debute with a very minor cameo. realizing their blunder some years later the BBC would rectify this by having the finale ep of prehistoric park centre around this large croc.

Didelphodon the token mammal of the episode. granted by this stage in geologic history mammals cropped up a lot, and the didelphodons were amongst the most common. you guessed it, and i'm getting tired of saying it, but i must. yet another new comer to hollywood...

Parksosaurus one can only think that the hypsilophodons had a very razor sharp agent. these otherwise completely ignored dinosaurian family (both in the popular eye and even scientifically almost) manage the most number of appearances at 3 out of 6 episodes. it helps that they were geologically successful, and present in a lot of prehistoric ecosystems, but man to get that conveyed ON SCREEN. i might have to get peter bond in touch with their agent, cause they sure got results!

Quetzalcoatlus a very brief but loving cameo for the largest flying animal of all time. quetzies are no stranger to the screen though getting the honour of killing the main character caveman in land that time forgot (mind you the quetzy there had to wear dentures for the role LOL).

Torosaurus beat out its close and much more popular relative triceratops for the role of lead ceratopsian. at the time touted as the largest skulled animal ever (now of course this title belongs to pentaceratops) it was hoped by the BBC this might gain some interest as torosaurs had never been on screen before. instead their rookie acting, and lack of majastey (compared to a triceratops anyways) left them sort of flat.

Tyrannosaurus nuff said

Dinilysia an early snake and mammal catcher makes an amuzing appearance as the target of tyrannoaur chick curiosity.

Dromaeosaurus the original raptor (in that it was found by humans first) finally get on screen, and earn themself stature and recognition towards (but not equaling) their cousins the velciraptors.

Triceratops the iconic and ultimate ceratopsian somehow yet again in the 90's is given an almost insulting role in a movie. in this case forced to play a mere carcasse right on the heels of JP1 where they were portrayed by a sick tranquilized individual (which is just a tad better than dead body in my opinion). the modern era just hasn't been kind to these guys. once they were acknowledged as the masters of the horned dinosaurs with epic roles such as 1 million years bc. it won't be up until last years (after massive protests and demands by the public) prehistoric park that triceratops finally got a modern appearance worthy of their stature of tyrannosaurs main prey item... er i mean rival.

Dinosaur Portrayal

walking with dinosaurs did nothing but good things for the public's understanding and appreciation for us saurians. not to mention their exposure to other prehistoric creatures never even hinted at before in popular culture.

even years later at the museum we were asked questions about our fossils and displays directly spurred by walking with.

perhaps where this series achieved the most was how it expanded on jurassic park's conveying dinosaurs as living breathing creatures. we saw everything from how some dinosaurs ate, to slept, to mated, and even how they died.

it showed that we didn't exist solely to inhabit isolated far away places simply to eat humans dumb enough to wander there. rather that we had been a very successful and thriving group of animals removed from humans, and totally undependant on them.

Impact on Dinosaur Perception

larry's goal of a series to inindate humanity with an accurate and realistic view of dinosaurian culture was truely realized.

not only did it succeed, but it was an international hit. spawning numerous sequels and spinoffs (which i have sitting in front of me waiting to be reviewed...).

Overall Score: 120%

chance discovery

what started out as just a day off, may have just become one of the most significant outings of my life...

as per my new year's resolutions i need to have more fun.

lately i've been having to find ways to have solo fun (and i don't mean watching han solo) as my friends are all away for the holidays (or just out right disappeared). back in the tyrrell days if you told me i needed to entertain myself without anyone else around i'd have been stumped... how does one have fun on their own.

now i'm not going to lie people of the web wide world i still think being social is way more fun than being by ones self. it is a nice change of pace though once and a while to just hang out with ones self (though due to the repercussions of my cousin larry's visit i may just be spending a lot more time on my own!)


my current favourite solo activity has been to go fishing. now that i've sorta mastered it (yeah that's right. in your face spinosaurs!!!) it's really fun!

another thing i really like about fishing is it gives me an excuse to head out of dunedin and explore more of beautiful new zealand. can you believe i've been here almost a year and only really seen around just dunedin?



well today i came to another really nice beach on the ocean. as the majestic waves splashed against the delicate sand a shroud of fog clung to the horizon... wow did you just read that people of the innerweb. with descriptive writing like that i could become an author or something!...

i should have taken that fog as a sign of things to come... as in mystery and adventure waited for me. they always have fog in movies with that stuff... though i'd come here with the goal of fishing what actually occurred was nothing i could have anticipated...

one of the key things about fishing is location. so i had to scout out this new foreign beach. i'd never been here before. how was i too know where a good spot would be?

as i looked around i was struck by how pretty this beach was... man i STILL love the ocean.

you'd think i was into the ocean just cause i grew up in such a landlocked and waterless place like drumheller . yet here i am having lived by the ocean almost a year (and seeing it quite a lot) and i still love it!

though as i hunted for a good fishing perch i was distracted by another wonder of nature. one i hadn't noticed in a while...

rocks.

now what could be appealing about rocks you might wonder? i mean hey their just rocks. they don't laugh. they don't sing. they don't do anything!

well growing up in a palaeontology musuem like the tyrrell i learned a thing or two about the wonderful world of rocks. more importantly i picked up a couple things (well okay i actually picked up a LOT of things, but was promptly told to put them back where i got them from) about the whole science of rocks. a science they call geology.

for those of you who don't yet appreciate it rather than not laugh, sing, or anything rocks do one thing really well: storytelling! now they don't tell you the story upfront sadly. rather they present it for you to uncover.

the texture of these rocks kicked in some of my latent tyrrell palaeo skills. i immediately zoned in on them to check them out.

low and behold my prospecting instincts revealed something very much like petrified wood...

wait a second... if some of you out there on the innerweb aren't into rocks than you probably don't know what i was doing or looking for when i say prospecting...

well only one way to fix that! time for yet another...

okay prospecting. well prospecting is a key part of being a fossil hunter and/or palaeontologist. it's the term we use to basically say "looking for fossils".


it's really not that complicated. you just point your eyes on the ground and look for anything interesting. just like this group of prospectors with Dr. Brinkman of the tyrrell museum.

now there are many ways to prospect, but here's the basics of good prospecting.

when looking for the big impressive specimens, it's important not to look for them... weird eh?

well the reason is that for 99% of fossils to be in the amazing shape they need to be in to be considered impressive the fossil needs to inside rock to protect it from the destructive and damaging forces of erosion. meaning that if your looking for a whole complete fossil to just be lying out on the ground you'll be disappointed.

first off you won't find it, because fossils erode pretty quick once exposed. meaning that if your treasure fossil does make it's way to the surface it won't be there long, and thus you won't see it at all. second if you do stumble on it within that short window of exposedness it will be still damaged by erosion. again meaning that you won't find or see a perfect specimen.

so what do you look for. well we use the destructive nature of erosion rather than fight it. as exposed fossil erodes broken off pieces get carried away like the rock around them. well if a fossil hunter looks for these loose pieces we can use them to follow the erosional trail back to where it came from. meaning that we now know the source of these fossils, and this may well lead us to those prize specimens i mentioned just buried beneath the surface...

the other great thing about this strategy is it allows you to be lazier. rather than climbing steep hills or covering ever square centimetre of ground you can just look in erosional channels. only once you've found something do you have to leave the beaten (or blown, washed, frozen, swept, etc.) path.


now that you're a prospecting expert (well okay the theory side anyway... you need to do a bit in the field before you get good at it) you can envision me back on the beach.

you should also be able to picture my conundrum. you see rather than seeing a small piece of interest i saw a whole hill of fossily texture. (oh yeah i forgot to mention in the fact. when you prospect you look for texture rather than shape or colour).

i could have sworn i was seeing a whole hill of petrified wood... yet that made no sense at all!

it had the straight vertical grain of petrified wood (and living none fossil wood for that matter). it was a bumpy grain like pet wood too.

but it was a whole hill!?!

my palaeo skills and knowledge told me this just couldn't be... either that or i'd just made the biggest find ever. a tree the diameter of... uh... well however many metres a hill is.

i peered in closer for inspection.

with this more in my face vantage point i started to discern the cause of my confusion, and more to the point the attractor of my attention.

though at first glance this rock (yeah that's right it was just a rock sadly) had all the characteristics of petrified wood texturally. it even had a lot of silica in it (fossil wood often is mineralized... fancy word for organic material being rockified... by silica... giving the wood glass like portions). however the none silica bits were all wrong. they were rock. a type of rock i'd never seen before.

that meant they HAD to be volcanic. the badlands of alberta, where all my fossil hunting experience is, have nothing but sedimentary rocks. thus i'm pretty good at identifying sedimentary rocks, but any sort volcanic rock and i'm hopeless. in fact i only know there's two different types, but i couldn't tell you much beyond that. that alone how to identify any of them...

though it was fun for a minute to get to do some fossil hunting i was kinda bummed out by that. i'd gotten so excited and pumped by that brief bit of prospecting. i forgot how much i missed it.

i forgot about fishing entirely as i wandered the beach. my thoughts were turning to lonely homesickness and depression which i fought off by trying to focus on the beauty and tranquility of the waves rolling in and out from the sandy stretch of beach i'd wandered on to.

just as the sorrow of being away from home was closing in on me, i noticed something out of the corner of my eye in the sand. had i not been in a prospecting zone that moment i probably would have missed it.

buried just below the sand was something shiny...

leaning in closer for a look i could only just make out a metallic surface covered in sand. suddenly a wave rolled in giving me a snout full of water for a moment. i was about to get angry and annoyed... till as the wave drew back to the sea it carried off much of the sand covering my find (see erosion happens all the time, and can be VERY quick!)

it was really shiny oval. though normally not really the sort of thing i'd look for it was kinda cool.

definitely not a fossil. which meant i had no idea what it was, nor if it was a good find...

problem with a brain the size of a peanut. if you haven't thought about something before it can be a bit of a BIG task when you finally start...

several more waves came in, washing away more of the sand covering my find. i focused all my tiny brains facilities on the object trying to figure out what it was, and if i should be excited.

after many minutes it suddenly the following dawned on me. it was definitely human made... metal doesn't form with such perfect shape or symmetry.

as of such it must serve a purpose...

than it occurred to me!

jewelry... it was some sort of geologically based ornament worn by humans (which considering their lack of horns, frills, crests, and feathers makes sense).

most important it is always valuable. i mean hey robbers are always trying to steal it in movies!

with this realization i picked up my new treasure... wait a second! i realized.

this could very easily be a treasure!

i'd seen jewelry just like this at work in the otago museum . more to the point how and why would a modern person lose something like this on the beach?

i wasn't sure of anything for now. what i did know was that i was going to have ms. rhonwyn have a look at this when she returned to the country. she'd be able to tell me what it was. more importantly it'd show her that i have skills at finding things. skills that are very useful to a museum!

so depending on what i found this could have been a really big milestone in my life people of the innerweb... don't get me wrong it's not like i haven't found things before. i've found more fossils than even you with big brains can count, but never has anything i found been this intact or complete before! (dinosaurs for example need at least 50% of some 250ish bones of a skeleton to be considered complete...).

this might be my first step toward that curatorship i've always wanted...

(checkout the behind the scenes story behind the discovery of this artifact at prehistoric insanity!)

hopes for 08

oops i missed new years.

don't get me wrong people of the web wide world. i'm not complaining, whining, or dredging for sympathy. it's just a statement of fact. i missed new years...

it didn't occur to me that it was a new year till i got back to work today and noticed the new number behind the january. kinda funny.

rather than let this bum me out like i've been letting everything else lately, i decided to go have a post celebration on my own, right after work.

the nice part about living in a big park is that your home has lots of nice pretty places to go chillaxate on your own for any occasion.

for my almost new year i decided on a slight out of the way segment of the garden i call grassy flat. why? well its flat and made of grass. making it appealing was the amazing view of downtown dunedin past the university (my home home is on the other side of the garden so i normally don't get this view).

making this the perfect spot was a nice bench i could plunk down on after not only a hard days work (well okay the security guard gig has been slow as of late. especially with ms. rhonwyn being away and not giving me new duties for my promotion), but also a hard year.

as i sat down it occurred to me what a year 2007 had been...

the year started off almost instantly with my smuggling myself into new zealand to try and get away from the dinosaur over crowding of north america.

though that part of the plan worked the government gave me those crazy criteria i had to meet including finding a home and getting a job.

fortunately i liked my job, and loved my new home.

i made some friends too.

it seemed everything was going to be just fine, and i might live happily ever after here in dinosaur-less new zealand. why is it those kinds of ends only happen in the movies though?

i ask because it was everything started to go kinda wrong...

i found out that i choose to live right on the edge of a legendary and dangerous maze inhabited by ghost lights!

than the destroyer of all hope destroyers showed up... larry. my JERK! of a cousin.

living all the progress i'd made in new zealand pretty much mute.

which is where i am here at the beginning of 2008. stranded in this far away land with the pieces of a great life i'd almost built for myself...

you might think this got me a little depressed people of the innerweb, and to be honest had my view at that moment been different it might have been my reaction. however the most amazing sight greeted my acknowledging the new year...

a beautiful sunset. one that was unbelievably gorgeous. yet painful to look at. the beams of light the sun throw out were too much for my eyes.

as the sun made it's way slowly below the horizon, and the light eased on my teary sore eyes, i realized something. that sunset was the last manifestation of 2007 (well in my slight behind the times world anyway).

just like the sun my life in new zealand was both magnificent, but more modernly painful. yet these things go away, like the sun, with the passage of time.

i'd sorta started to try and leave behind all the bad of larry's visit recently (what with the fishing , and learning to talk to birds), but i hadn't thought about the future. i'd only been thinking about the present. considering what i know of how time really works (in the geologic sense of the clock) this was foolish stance of me to take...

i needed some new years revolutions... er... what was that word craig and dan used to use during new years back in drumheller ? anyways some goalish like things to try and do from here on in.

hmmmm guess i'll need to make a list than...

first off i'm going to over feeling sorry for myself, and move beyond larry's visit

B. try and get things going at work, and make them expand my job as per my promotion

3. start working on some of my political goals. in particular dinosaur/human relations. how or what is beyond me. as it's a goal i can just start thinking about it for now...

5. post more often on my blog. things got a little busy in 07, and i sometimes only posted a few times a month. this tells me i wasn't having enough fun, as i love roaming the web wide world. so more posts means i'm having more fun!

uh looking at my list i might also add a goal of being a better list maker too.

okay so here we go. a new year. full of new oppurtunities, but let's face it be up front probably a lot more challanges and snags. key i guess is rather than think of it a year at a time, go one day at a time...

glimmer of happiness (bird speak part 1)

at the risk of sounding like a whiner people of the web wide world my life sucks these days...

i know i've done nothing but mostly moan and complain about stuff lately, but i'm not being a dramasaur when i say that my cousin larry completely destroyed everything i had going here in my new life in new zealand.

granted i did manage to fix things with owain, and i still have my job. however in this month of decemeber you'd hardly notice these things. that alone their being good.

owain went off to the north island to be with his family for x-mas, so i have NO one to hang out with (especially in light of craig's sudden disappearance).

though i have work to keep me occupied a lot of the time (i've taken on a bunch of extra shifts in light of nothing else to do) it is still just my regular old "boring" security job. larry managed to rob the fun of my job by pointing out how unglamourous it is (i really used to like it to). there hasn't been a sign of ms. rhonwyn or the new duties and responsibilities she gave me in my promotion.

much like novemeber i haven't posted much due to depression combined with the blog killer nothing happening in my life. can't talk about stuff that doesn't happen.

due to sheer boredom at the beginning of this week, caused by all the humans of dunedin doing x-mas stuff, i wandered aimlessly around the botanic garden before my next monotonous shift.

without thinking about it i strolled into the aviary, the site of the beginning and end of larry's visit. when i noticed where i was i initially didn't really care... until suddenly a bird's call caught my attention...

"hello," i thought i heard. i looked over to see a parrot. i figured it was just one of those talking parrots you see in pirate movies. i wasn't in the mood to talk to a pirate today... it scwalked again in bird speak i couldn't understand with a "the" in the middle of it...

however i realized something. it wasn't in english... though it had a heavy accent, and was almost different in structure this parrot had spoke almost coelurosaurian.

this drew my attention right in. in hindsight the presentation of something unfamiliar and mysterious was just what the doctor had ordered to break me out of my depression/routine stupor.

"hello," i said back. the kea, i noted from her aviary sign, chirped happily back.

"how are you?" i asked slowly, making every word separate and clear.

she replied a long reply. not that i understood a bit of it.

"traumador," i said bobbing my head. this motion is the same a pointing at yourself in theropod. the reason we do this you might ask? well you try pointing with an arm that barely clears your chest!

she tilted her head clearly noting what i had done. i repeated it several more times.

i was gratified on the sixth or seventh time with "hine," her head bobbed.

so her name was hine... maybe... i wanted to test. "hine," i said arching my neck downward. the theropod version of pointing at something.

she immediately responded arching her neck as much as a parrot can "traumador."

i couldn't believe it... i was talking to a bird! sorta anyway... i'd noticed when i came to the aviary just before larry's arrival that i thought i heard familiar sounds in their voices, and that i should look into it, but in the wake of all the misery of late i forgot about this idea (probably of a brain the size of a peanut i guess).

i must have spent a couple hours standing there trying to talk to my new friend hine. despite a good start to this process things slowed down a lot from there. seems that bird speech has changed a lot in the 65 million years since we coelurosaurs went extinct...

if i'm gathering it right also the change of hunting forelimbs into flying wings has changed a lot of the torso down body language. the only thing we seem to understand of each other's is neck and head motions.

then came a big break through... pointing at the cage i got an answer i followed! "... makes ... ... feel trapped."

hine didn't like being caged... who would?... but i understood her! that and i could now put my talon on the emotion conveyed by her weird body sway.

it was an amazing start to our "friendship". two creatures distantly related MILLIONS of years apart! i immediately planned on regularly coming back to try and bridge this gap between us.

sadly as i needed to get to work soon (after what must of have been now 3-4 hours... i lost track of time for the first time in a month!) i tried to conclude. "bye," with the theropod motion of the tail for conclusion. she just looked at me blankly. "good bye." "farewell." "have to go."

nothing. rather than leave her confused i repeated "bye." to her a few more times, and than left at a slow but steady pace. just as i was leaving eye distance she said something three times. clearly trying to reinforce it like i had... i took it to be her version of "bye", and so i tried to copy it back to her. hoping i'd guessed right.

as i walked by other bird enclosures i tried a brief introduction to see if i'd just imagined the whole thing in a desperate attempt to forget my whole current situation. it looked grim for a few cages. none of the song birds responded specifically, that alone constructedly. all i got were random replies or even ignored out right.

i started to lose my optimism, and could feel my heart sinking as i thought i'd been day dreaming or something. snapping me out of my reemerging gloom a cockatoo called back "hello ..."

i tried out the name game, and was rewarded with yet another name. shoe. not exactly a normal sounding name, but than again my name isn't exactly one that comes up much either...

carrying on with the cages i found it was only parrots and other psittacines who could understand me and vice versa (psittacines is the fancy scientific name for the parrot bird family). this was an interesting development that i noted, and was going to have to explore soon.

for the first time in two months i felt exhilarated at work, and the time just flow by. i even decided it was time to get out and live a little. so i turned down working tomorrow's shift, and took my first day off from work this whole month.

what did i do with my day off? well i set out for port chalmers. now i haven't been to port chalmers since doing that show with andrew during my whole countdown of doom. as the name implies it was a port, but what does a tyrannosaur possibly want to do at a port you might ask?

well for starters its on the ocean. i LOVE the ocean. it has big boats. i LOVE big boats. making it different from most ocean type places that i've visited around dunedin and BC this one has all sorts of cool sci-fi looking machinery all over the place.

it's like the temperature on hoth suddenly increased melting all the ice, but yet the empire is still invading LOL

the biggest draw for me today though... where there's ocean there has to be fish!

come ice age or high water i wasn't leaving the port today until i caught at least one fish! not a boot fish like the last couple times (that's right not one occasion but two).

so i cast off my line, and took in the beautiful and cool scenery of the port as i waited for what i hoped would be my lucky day. after all don't they say the third ones a charm?

the only problem with fishing, especially salmon fishing that i was trying, is that you spend about 2 minutes prepping the hooks and line 10 seconds casting it off, and than the rest of the time just letting it sit there.

even with my ubber short attention span (thanks again to my small brain case) there's only so many waves, boats, sea birds, and false bite alarms that can distract me from what some might consider a very boring interlude in the fishing process.

where every other bit of ideal time in decemeber i'd have been brooding on my life post-larry, this time i found i was on happy thoughts. in fact grand thoughts...

what if i caught the biggest salmon ever seen? what if it wasn't just a bit bigger than your normal salmon, but was the Amphicoelias of fish.

Amphicoelias is a legendary almost mythical sauropod dinosaur who was based on a few monstrous vertebras indicated a long necked dino almost 67 metres long!

just imagine that. a long necked dinosaur twice the length of a blue whale! though it probably still weighed nothing compared to the whale, but twice as long is something!

so why isn't it celebrated as the largest dinosaur of all time? (i seem to want to quiz you this post people of the innerweb)

well the thing is, leading to Amphicoelias's mythical status, is that the vertebrae disappeared in the 1890's. discovered by cope during the famous bone wars (though how you get fossils to fight a war is a bit beyond me?!?) he drew a single picture of it, and no one of the time raised a fuss about this (which they would have at the time had he been making it up, as tensions among palaeontologists were a little high during this war), and than puff the bones disappeared...

leaving us with a fantastic benchmark for the fossil that got away...

so there i was picturing catching the biggest fish that you ever saw. snared on my line and brilliant step up bait and hook. throwing itself in and out of the water in desperate battle with my reeling. till the end i'm somehow triumphed.

than comes the make belief news coverage. i go from public enemy number one, like i still am every now and than on the TV. suddenly i'd be a national fishing hero. the kiwis are big on their fishing and outdoors stuff.

catching such a make belief, but ever so unpossible (but not impossible), fish would be the coolest thing ever. not to mention how it'd fix my problems.

suddenly interrupting my imagining, the line started to tug. which is funny cause until now i've never seen my line actually tug before!

i was at a slight confusion of what to do. i didn't think a boot could or would put up this much fight...

after seriously a 40 minute battle of the fishing trying for its life to escape, and me desperately trying to figure out how to actually pull in a fish the most amazing thing happened...

i actually caught a fish!!! my first one ever! it wasn't even a small one, but a 10 pound chinook salmon!!!

alright i'm definitely going fishing again! hopefully talking to the birds soon too...

so there you go people of the web wide world. sometimes it's the small things that make life worth going.

goners...

well now that it's december, and i wasted the whole month of november feeling sorry for myself, it's time to try and make things right. in the wake of my cousin larry's visit almost every aspect of my dunedin life has been shattered or altered. thus far i've done far too little to try and repair this damage.

of course as you know people of the web wide world i did manage to mend things with my buddy owain after his terrifying run in with my 15 metre relative. with the success of the direct approach with owain i decided i'd have to bite the bullet (which despite my massive t-rex jaw muscles would still hurt!... why is it people bite bullets before doing other painful things i wonder?) and try to fix my greatest mistake, and the biggest damage from larry's stay.
that was of course my directly attacking and insulting craig, my legal guardian. i totally fell into a mental trap set by larry convincing me that humans were my enemy, and i took this out on craig. the one human who has never been my enemy...

i'd hurt craig's feelings so bad (which in fairness i was harsh... he did raise me from the egg till i wanted to move out on my own) that he wasn't returning my calls or emails. meaning that the only way i could fix things was the direct approach... i figured i'd deal with the craig end first and track down an ammo store for the bullet later.

so first thing bright and early i plucked up my courage and set out for craig's home at salmond hall.

i'm not going to lie people of the webwide world i was not looking forward to this conversation at all. with owain he'd only been scarred by larry, and it had nothing to do with me, so it was an easy fix. craig on the other hand. man oh man. i'd been as big a JERK! to him as larry typically is to me...

arriving at craig's room i hesitated outside for several minutes hoping that somehow he'd start off this whole thing, and i won't have to... yeah okay kinda a dumb idea i admit people of the innerweb, but it seemed a lot easier than me doing it.

alas after several minutes of having no company but my pounding heart i finally knocked the door... the result of which was definately not what i expected.

the door just swung open! it hadn't been closed or locked at all.

reveiling a way less expected result. the room was completely EMPTY!!!

seriously everything was gone. it hardly looked like the same place i'd crashed when i first moved to new zealand.

i must have been so stressed about facing craig i'd gone to the wrong room or something. there wasn't a trace of him to be found anywhere.

that is till i turned around. there on the now empty dresser sat a vanilla coke... craig's calling card drink (he was addicted to this stuff when it came out, my hatching year so i'd know... he used to drink litres of the stuff).

i sat starring at the room even longer than i did the door. confusion and shock mostly replaced the stress (though a new stress was taking its place).

craig had simply disappeared. in the last couple days (owain had just talked to him) he'd somehow packed up and left. completely undetected.

his neighbors knew nothing of this. they didn't believe me when i came to ask. the front office could only tell me "an outside party had paid off his account".

so much for the direct approach.

rather than one loose end now i'm left with a whole unravelling knitted good worth of ends.
how am i going to fix things with him now? how am i going to contact him? is he okay? will i ever see or speak to him again?!? did he do this because of what i did?

to be honest people of the webwide world i feel worse right now than when i was fired from the tyrrell... which i thought was the most i've been cut off from home...

even though i didn't hang out with him much, having the only parent-like figure i've ever had run off after i pulled a hissy fit makes me feel like i cut myself off from home rather than vice a versa...

there's only one bright side... at least i didn't get the bullet first!

_

(Production Note from Prehistoric Insanity: We applogize for the delays in the Tyrannosaur Chronicles through the month of December. For the full behind the scene story check out the brand new Prehistoric Insanity Website. Not only does it have behind the scenes info on everyone's fav dwarf T-Rex, but will soon feature many of our other productions and projects!)