
I like Dinosaurs, since when I was very young I have had a huge Interest in some of God’s most Amazing Animals. While I do not believe in Evolution I do believe in the existence of Dinosaurs. There are thousands of skeletons around the world and some of these are related to skeletons already discovered and from this we have proof of Dinosaurs. Evolution is a pretty stupid Idea; How can something like Dimetrodon turn into Gorgonopsid or how can Ambulocetus turn into Basilosaurus (none of these creatures are Dinosaurs but show a Good Point in showing that Evolution is a load of Rubbish). Over the years I have managed to gain knowledge to become (at least I think I am) an expert on these Fantastic Creatures. I have been wanting to do blog posts about them for a very long time and I am finally going to start.

Now if you are confused about the title I will explain with a quote from Wikipedia: “The discovery of Iguanodon has long been accompanied by a popular legend. The story goes that Gideon Mantell‘s wife, Mary Ann, discovered the first teeth of an Iguanodon in the strata of Tilgate Forest in Whitemans Green, Cuckfield, Sussex, England, in 1822 while her husband was visiting a patient. However, there is no evidence that Mantell took his wife with him while seeing patients. Furthermore, he admitted in 1851 that he himself had found the teeth. Not everyone agrees that the story is false, though”. So you can see that the creature was discovered in 1822. The word Dinosaur which means Terrible Lizard was created by Richard Owen in 1842. So the creature was discovered 20 years before a name was given to describe the creature, back then it was probably just a form of Reptile.

Iguanodon is also a tribute to the early days of paleontology and shows the inaccuracies that can occur with a newly discovered piece of history, in this case animals. When Iguanodon was first discovered and examined Mantell had an idea of what the creature looked like. It was a large animal that walked on all 4 legs and had a horn on its nose. In 1854 2 years after the death of Mantell Iguanodon sculptures were unveiled in Crystal Palace London along with many other sculptures of extinct species and these sculptures can still be seen to this day. However today the Iguanodon sculptures are inaccurate to later discoveries. Mantell believed that the creature may have had forelimbs like arms but died before he could look more into it and so the Crystal Palace sculptures based on his ideas and designs were shown as what the creature looked like and it stayed this way for a long time. It was not until the discovery of several skeletons in 1878 in Bernissart in Belgium that the idea of these creatures standing up was finally seen. The Horn was also discovered not to have been a horn at all but a Thumb Spike. The fossils discovered in Belgium were among some of the first complete Dinosaur Skeletons discovered. More recent idea’s suggest that the creature may have walked on 4 legs and ran on 2 legs. So there were inaccuracies when dinosaurs were first discovered but this was 171 years before the Velociraptor Inaccuracies in Jurassic Park.

Iguanodons were not just special for being some of the first dinosaur discoveries they are also special in their anatomy. It is a widely known fact that reptiles can’t chew. Unlike humans they can’t move their mouths around and so they have to gulp their food. Some reptiles have found ways around this like Crocodiles who do something called death rolling where they twist food to rip off small pieces of food and make it easier to digest. Some species eat stones so that when food enters the stomach it crushes the food. Iguanodon’s and species related to them like the duck-billed Dinosaurs had a battery of teeth in its mouth which helped it to crush up food and the design of its jaw enabled it to move its mouth from side to side enabling it to chew.

Iguanodon is one of the greatest discoveries in Paleontology, a Dinosaur before Dinosaurs were named and for a herbivore it is huge. Without Iguanodon there may not have been Dinosaurs at all because it was for this creature and a few other creatures that the word Dinosaur was created. Without the discovery of Iguanodon the world of paleontology would be a whole lot different.
GENEPOOL
Like this:
Like Loading...