Bryan Gee, Ph.D.
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Temno Talk: a blog about all things temnospondyl

New publication: Dissorophid diversity at the early Permian cave system near Richards Spur, Oklahoma (Gee, Bevitt, & Reisz, 2019; Palaeontologica Electronica)

7/31/2019

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Title: Dissorophid diversity at the early Permian cave system near Richards Spur, Oklahoma.
Authors: B.M. Gee, J.J. Bevitt, R.R. Reisz
Journal: Palaeontologia Electronica, article 22.2.46
Link to paper - this is an open access paper than anyone can read!
Picture

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The Dog Days of Dissorophids, Week 1: Cacops

7/30/2019

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We're really in the dog days of summer up here in Toronto (remind me not to move somewhere with humid summers for my next job), so I'm putting a spin on this for the next couple weeks with a series I'm calling "The Dog Days of Dissorophids," where I talk about my actual dissertation study system for once instead of waxing poetic about metoposaurids. This may or may not be foreshadowing an in press publication as well...

What's a dissorophid?
To kick off this thematic series of blog posts, we first have to discuss what a dissorophid is. Dissorophids are part of a clade called Dissorophoidea. It's very easy to mix up 'dissorophid' and 'dissorophoid,' including when you've added both of them to your computer's dictionary. Usually what I tell people is that 'dissorophoid' has more letters, so it is the more inclusive (more all-encompassing) taxonomic group. Dissorophids show up in the fossil record in the Late Carboniferous when temnospondyls start really taking off (along with other tetrapod groups). They stick around until the late Permian, but they really hit their peak in the early Permian of North America - they're pretty sparse in other places for some reason. One of their most distinctive features (among other things), is the presence of osteoderms (bony armour plates) along the backbone. This isn't necessarily protective armour in the same way that some other animals have very extensive coverings for protection (e.g., crocs, ankylosaur dinosaurs), and some work (Dilkes & Brown, 2007; Dilkes, 2009) has suggested that based on the association with only the backbone, dissorophid armour was for stiffening the backbone to prevent too much swaying when walking (inefficient on land). Osteoderms are very diverse among dissorophids, a theme that I'll revisit throughout this topical series. Dissorophids were definitely terrestrial (the total opposite of my favourite metoposaurids) and probably ran around terrorizing smaller tetrapods. Dissorophids aren't gigantic - most of them had skulls in the 5-10 cm range, which would put their bodies around 15-40 cm - but that's still larger than a lot of modern amphibians!
Picture
Photographs of Cacops aspidephorus showing the osteoderms (marked by 'e' in this figure by Dilkes & Brown, 2007).

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We the north: a brief history of Canadian temnospondyls

7/2/2019

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In honour of Canada Day, this week's blog post (delayed post since I'm in the field right now) covers the few (but notable) Canadian temnospondyls. Note that this is a brief, not a comprehensive history, considering there's quite a lot of articles spanning over 150 years and also that I wrote this in between a conference and packing for fieldwork (P.S. I'm in the field now, sorry about any errors or typos!).

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    About the blog

    A blog on all things temnospondyl written by someone who spends too much time thinking about them. Covers all aspects of temnospondyl paleobiology and ongoing research (not just mine).

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