PORTAL:PALEONTOLOGY DYK 19

A life restoration of stag-moose with a human to scale

...that the Stag-moose (Cervalces scotti) went extinct about 11,500 years ago, part of a mass extinction of large North American mammals toward the end of the most recent ice age?
... that the only known specimen of the extinct planthopper Glisachaemus jonasdamzeni is preserved with a parasitic mite?
... that the plesiosaur Bathyspondylus was first described in 1982 from a specimen collected in 1774?
... that the dinosaur Wendiceratops (pictured) was named for fossil hunter Wendy Sloboda, who then had it tattooed on her arm in celebration?
... that the extinct Miocene hickory Carya washingtonensis is known from over 50 nuts found as a rodent cache within a petrified stump?

... that the bioluminescent crustacean Vargula hilgendorfii, named after Franz Hilgendorf, was used as a light source by Japanese soldiers in World War II?
... that unusual archosauromorph reptile Teraterpeton from the Late Triassic of Nova Scotia had nostril openings in its skull that were longer than its eye sockets?
... that Stephen Jay Gould once called Donald Prothero "the best punctuated equilibrium researcher on the West Coast"?
... that the only known specimen of the early crocodile relative Stegomosuchus was kept in the discoverer's yard for several years before being given over for study?
...that the discovery of the dinosauromorph Dromomeron, from the Late Triassic of New Mexico, indicates that dinosaurs did not rapidly replace their close relatives?

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