Looking for a bit of help getting back into it

[Manuel Parrado]

Hello, all. I hope I don't get kicked out on my first message to the group, since this is not the typical kind after browsing a few pages.

I had an intense "vertebrate paleontology phase" for a good year and a half between 2004 and early 2006.  I used to be a lurker in the old DML, and occasionally posted questions, which I was glad to learn I can still find in the reptilis.net archive.  Reviewing now my book purchase history in Amazon and looking at some of my questions posted to the DML and over old emails I was surprised to see how much I read during that brief period and how deep my interest ran at the time.  

Even though I lost the passion almost as quickly as I developed it, over the years I have very sporadically perused the web for some of the most significant recent discoveries in dinosaur paleontology. I also read Brusatte's excellent "Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs" book in 2020, and a few days ago I finished Michael Benton's wonderful "Dinosaurs Rediscovered".  This last one seems to have pushed me over the edge and made me want to rekindle my old passion.

With that background out of the way, if you have managed not to click away until now I am looking for some help catching my bearings anew in the world of vertebrate paleontology, especially dinosaurs:

Discussions:

Is the Dinosaur Mailing Group now the best place to find a confluence of experts, lay persons, and everyone in-between to ask questions and hold discussions on dinosaur paleontology?  Are there similar outlets I should consider?

Phylogenetic relationships:

Is the tree of life web (tolweb.org) still the best accessible resource to consult for our latest understanding of how all living species are related to each other?  Was it ever?  At first glance it doesn't look much different from what I remember it all those years ago and references look quite old, but it's what I used in the past.

Dinosaur Books:

I know this probably gets asked much too often, but after having sold all my old books years ago, I'm trying to assemble a new collection, especially since after 20 years the science should have progressed significantly without me :-))

Back then, the core of my knowledge was "The Complete Dinosaur" (1st Ed) - Brett-Surman et. al., 1999, but I read quite a few others that were of recent vintage at the time.

I'm considering the 2nd edition of the same book, although being from 2012 it too might be getting a bit long in the tooth, so I would appreciate advice on alternatives for another, perhaps more updated comprehensive book about dinosaur paleontology that will make me a "dangerous" amateur again.

Aside from that learning core, I would like to have a reference dinosaur book with descriptions, information and illustrations of as many species as possible.  I'm thinking not something as expensive as Glut's encyclopedia (it was just as expensive back then), so I have my eye on The Complete Book of Dinosaurs - Dougal Dixon, 2012, though perhaps that is getting old as well, so recommendations for newer and affordable reference books are welcomed.

Other Paleo Books:

Besides dinosaurs, I have alwyas also been interested in exitinct marine reptiles (specifically plesio/pliosaurs, Ichtyosaurs, and mosasaurs), pterosaurs, the history of evolution of life on earth, and I am especially fascinated with the vertebrates' transition from water to the land.

Below are the books I read "back in the day".  I could use some recommendations on newer books that cover these subjects, unless any of these books are still relevant enough that there aren't better choices available.

Sea Dragons: Predators of the Prehistoric Oceans - Richard Ellis, 2003

The Pterosaurs: From Deep Time - David Unwin, 2005

Aquagenesis: The Origin and Evolution of Life in the Sea - Richard Ellis, 2001

At the Water’s Edge - Carl Zimmer, 1999

Documentaries:

Lastly, if anybody has any recommendations for recent documentaries that are well regarded for accuracy and informational value, I'll take those too.  I've been watching and enjoying the new Walking With Dinosaurs series.  I used to own the original one and its immediate successors, and it was part of what kicked me into my first foray into dinosaurs.  I have the recent Prehistoric Planet on my list too, but I don't have Apple TV+.

My apologies for the unnecessarily long message and thank you in advance.

[Gregory Paul]

Well of course there are the Princeton Field Guides to sea reptiles, pterosaurs, dinosaurs 3rd ed, predatory dinosaurs, pro/sauropods later this year, and ornithischians next year. Of course I am completely unbiased in making these recommends;) 

GSPaul 

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[Franco Sancarlo]

I can actually say that Paul he's right, his guides are among the best you can find at the moment. They have excellent drawings and a very good taxonomy register that has most of the species considered valid.

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[Manuel Parrado]

Thank you for your recommendations, folks.

There is absolutely no shame in self-promotion, as far as I'm concerned :-)

Take care, 

Manuel

[Gregory Paul]

I am not one who has shame;)

GSPaul

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[Tim Williams]

For those interested, here are two reviews of the first edition of The Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs :

doi.org/10.1080/02724634.2011.576734

dx.doi.org/10.1080/08912963.2012.670534

(Both reviews are paywalled, so I've attached as pdf's)

[Thomas Yazbek]

Hello Manuel,

Don't worry about having 'too long' of a message!

Tolweb is totally outdated. Palaeos.com is more up to date but I'm not sure if anybody's still contributing to that, either. Some classic paleo websites have been rotting away, but there's no substitute to Toby White's excellent and funny essays on Palaeos - even if new info has deprecated some of them. AFAIK, DML is still the best spot for vertpal discussion but there can also be some good conversations on Facebook/Twitter and in the comment sections of blogs like Tetrapod Zoology.

Re: dinosaur encyclopedias - The Dinosauria is probably the biggest and the best, but be warned that it is NOT amateur-friendly and is getting outdated (been a long time since the last edition and it's gigantic). Complete Dinosaur is good though. I don't know if there's been a comparable lay-audience encyclopedia that's come out in the last decade, but as others have mentioned, Greg Paul's Princeton field guides are must-haves.

Re: marine reptiles, check out the Oceans of Kansas website/book. You have good taste in discovering Richard Ellis (RIP), but Oceans of Kansas is a more detailed look at the Cretaceous marine life of North America. For pterosaurs, check out Mark Witton's writing (he wrote at least one book and has a great blog). Wellnhofer's encyclopedia is also great but a bit outdated. I know there's a few ptero workers here, so chime in if I am missing something.

Unfortunately I think the nature of media/communications nowadays has been making it tougher to produce and maintain good websites and publish good books for the lay public. Learning how to at least peruse scientific papers is a good skill since, even in this day and age, it takes a long time for the newest research to get into books. Feels like about 80% of DML messages are either "anybody have this paper" or links to new papers. The list of actually good lay books is pretty short and (to me) quite boring, since I already know the basics about dinosaurs. Abstracts usually get published in full on here.

Thomas Yazbeck

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[Gregory Paul]

Although being able to read scientific papers is a big plus, lots of them are behind paywalls and require access to a university library. I think Science and Nature are on public library systems. 

There is my book on Mesozoic sea reptiles, and another by Darren Naish. 

GSPaul

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[Manuel Parrado]

Very useful!

Thank you for attaching the reviews.

Manuel

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[Manuel Parrado]

Thank you very much for your detailed reply, Thomas!

To your point, it does feel like online resources have become more fragmented and diluted in the 20 years I was away.

I did not mention it in my initial email but I did read the Oceans of Kansas book at the time.  What I did not realize until your mention of it prompted me to look is that there is a newer edition of it from 2017, so that's great!  I'll add it to my list.  I have toiling away in the background and that list has become quite extensive (including Witton's book on pterosaurs).  Thank you for your other book recommendations.

I had better get my eyeballs well oiled for all the reading that's ahead of me.

Best regards,

Manuel

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[Leo Sham]

This discussion brings back a lot of fond old memories! I started seriously reading about dinosaurs in the late 90's too, when I entered university and some researches on non major subjects were required. I vaguely remember there were the big three - The Dinosauria (UCP), Encyclopedia of the Dinosaurs (Academic Press) and D:TE (Don Glut's, running into the 7th supplement in 2015). At that time the 1st ed of The Complete Dinosaur (IUP) was quite thin and small, but the 2nd ed was much improved, delightfully with Dr. Darren Naish's chapter on birds.

Besides his more well known book The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs, Dr. Steve Brusatte actually had written an earlier semi-technical one: Dinosaur Paleobiology (Blackwell/Wiley). The systematics session was splendid, though (I personally think) the latter part on paleobiology read like a school project summarizing a patchwork of papers. Also, both Drs. Mike Benton and Dave Hone published non/quasi technical books on dinosaur behavior recently. I love Dr. Hone's book for its extensive reference session, though his overarching tone sounds a bit "nihilistic" ... if nothing could be concluded with a fair degree of certainty, why do we establish this subject of study at all?

I know our respectful Greg Paul is here, but allow me a small space for a small protest. I just feel that his recent series with Princeton is less useful than supposed to be. The front session of these books (general discussions) are all similar, and the back session (species list) are wonderful to look at (skeletals) but vague and thin on information. From the layman's perspective, one cannot tell if the meager info under each species are speculations, assertions or evidence based, and they are not referenced therein. From time to time I flipped through the classical Predatory Dinosaurs of the World, I feel it was still better written and more thorough than his recent works.

[As a declaration of interest, though, I have bought almost ALL of Greg's books over these decades as a support, probably only except his 2000 book for Scientific American, which I read without buying (sorry, I just didn't like the squarish dimensions of the book)].

Hmm, enough of nostalgia: shouldn't we be thrilled and expecting the 3rd ed of both The Dinosauria and The Complete Dinosaur?

[Manuel Parrado]

Thank you for your honest assessments and detailed explanation, Leo.  When I briefly got into it back in late '04, those were indeed the prime references everybody would recommend.  

I would be more excited about the new editions of both books if they were more of a certainty.  From what little I can gather, neither have firm dates.  In the case of The Dinosauria, it is not even clear a new edition will happen at all, unless anybody has any insight on the future of these books.

Regards,

Manuel

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[Luis Alcalá]

Dear Manuel, for those interested in Iberian dinosaurs and who understand Spanish (updated early 2020):

https://www.editorialsusaeta.com/es/animales-y-naturaleza/12075-dinosaurios-de-la-peninsula-iberica-9788467772012.html

Regards, Luis

El 30/06/2025 a las 14:36, Manuel Parrado escribió:

Thank you for your honest assessments and detailed explanation, Leo.  When I briefly got into it back in late '04, those were indeed the prime references everybody would recommend.  

I would be more excited about the new editions of both books if they were more of a certainty.  From what little I can gather, neither have firm dates.  In the case of The Dinosauria, it is not even clear a new edition will happen at all, unless anybody has any insight on the future of these books.

Regards,who are

Manuel

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[Alberta Claw]

I'd add to the list of recommendations Dinosaurs: How They Lived and Evolved by Darren Naish and Paul Barrett, a good general audience overview of the current state of dinosaur paleontology. The third and most recent edition came out in 2023, so it's reasonably up to date as these types of works go. The public lecture notes for Thomas Holtz's undergraduate dinosaur course are still updated yearly and provide useful summaries of current understanding as well.

For phylogenetic relationships in general, there's OneZoom. It only covers extant taxa and there are some areas that could use updating still, but it probably draws from more recent references than ToL at this point. And Wikipedia articles at least for well-studied groups of animals generally aren't bad when it comes to citing recent phylogenetic studies.

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[Franco Sancarlo]

I personally would recommend the How to draw dinosaurs series by Tracy Lee Ford, volume 5 will be out in a few months. In addition to that, I personally recommend: Dinosaurs the textbook by Spencer G. Lucas, the latest edition I mean. I also enjoyed Dinosaurs Behavior by Michael J Benton and, for the last one that comes to mind, Vertebrate Evolution by Donald R. Prothero

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[Gregory Paul]

Funny thing about the 2000 SciAmer book I edited. It is still in the Baltimore public libraries, sometimes as the only dinobook on the shelf. Not good. Is WAY out of date. 

They should have my field guides and of course I am not at all biased on that ha ha. 

There will never be another PDW. That was about the last era when such a book could be published by a major trade publisher (the editor Alice Mayhew also edited the Woodward and Bernstein Watergate books) and be so technical, and enjoy enough sales to allow a major advance and royalites. These days such books are only possible via academic presses such and Indiana Univ and the author gets hardly any return. And the amount of work to do all the specimen #s etc etc has become vast and impractical, and much of it is on Wikipedia anyhow. Don G's Dinosaurs The Encyclopedia will never be seen again, and he did it for little compensation. 

The Princeton guides to specific dinogroups are a very good idea. The overall dinoguide has very limited discussions of issues about the specific groups. The subgroup guides give the opportunity to take closer looks at them. I did a whole lot of work rewriting the front sections. The Pred Dinos has a revamped historical intro that focuses on theropods, starting with Megalosaurs over Iquanodon, Allosaurus, Ceratosaurus, Torvosaurus over saoropods and stegosaurs, and so on. The section on the evolution of dinosaurs over time is from the perspective of theropods. The biology sections are heavily overhauled -- lots more about theropod senses, respiration, digestion, gigantism, not much about the herbivores. There is a long section on dinosaur hunting with some not mainline ideas (such as herbivorous dinos may have fled into the water as mammals sometimes do today). The guide on saurpodomorphs while likewise take a look from their situations and biology. Same for the one on ornithischians which will be the first book on that group. 

Each species entry is brief. These are popular field guides, not academic press books. If I did the long entries on each species like PDW the book would be massive, expensve, sell few copies, and I would do them pretty much gratis. I do try to note disagreements on various items. 

On occasion there have been complaints that the colors are not all the big lavish oll paintings. Get a grip. These take a few weeks each, simply not enough time. I can spend only a few days on a given illustration. And what would I do with them all? Very likely all the art I have will end up trashed when I become a fossil meself (same for a lot of paleoart I suspect). I believe some of my original art has already been lost when those who bought them were no longer able to keep them (in one case the new retiree who bought major pieces in the 80s 90s asked if I wanted to buy them back, otherwise they would not be saved, I declined).

GSPaul 

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[DrgnmstrZ111]

I would also like to add to the list. I really love Thomas R. Holtz Jr’s book Dinosaur, however it is quite outdated. It is still a very good read, as well as having a list of dinosaurs (albeit from 2007) and beautiful illustrations by Luis V. Rey.

On Jun 30, 2025, at 5:28 PM, 'Gregory Paul' via Dinosaur Mailing Group <DinosaurMa...@googlegroups.com> wrote:



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[Thomas Yazbek]

True, although I started to realize that as I was writing and mentioned abstracts as a way to quickly keep up with research.

Greg - I really need to get my hands on more of your recent books. I just have the 1st edition of the Princeton Dinosaur guide. I don't think my local library has them all.

TY

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[Gregory Paul]

The 1st edition is way out of date. Lots has happened since then. An advantage of doing prehistoric field guides is that they rapidly obsolesce, so they need frequent replacing:) 

GSPaul

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[Eric Snively]

Hi Manuel,

Take a look at Dinosaur World, illustrated by Julius Csotonyi and written by Evan Johnson-Ransom. The book has life reconstructions of every dinosaur genus. It's a good complement to the skeletal reconstructions in Greg Paul's field guides. Julius if a molecular biologist with interests in color, and the colors of his dinosaurs are well- informed by mechanisms of coloration. Evan has encylopedic knowledge of dinosaurs. The biology text emphasizes feeding (Evan's specialty) and evidence for behavioral interactions.

Eric

[Isaac Wilson]

I'll second that. I have a copy of Dinosaur World, and it's a great addition to any paleontological library while being accessible to a general audience.

Isaac

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[Tim Williams]

Leo Sham <drle...@gmail.com> wrote:

>  From the layman's perspective, one cannot tell if the meager info under each species are speculations, assertions or 

> evidence based, and they are not referenced therein.

I have the same view.  I found the speculative evolution in the Princeton Field Guide to be mildly annoying.  In general, it would be better for the reader to know which ideas have broad support in the paleontological literature (and are referenced accordingly), and which ideas are GSP freewheeling.  I can (usually) tell the difference.  But other readers might not - and think "Ah so paleontologists now think that therizinosaurs are descended from flying jeholornithids."  

Of course, GSP has a perfect right to come up with novel and heterodox ideas, and put them into his Field Guides.  However, it would be useful to know that they are *his* ideas, and not representative of current dinosaur research.

[Mickey Mortimer]

"Aside from that learning core, I would like to have a reference dinosaur book with descriptions, information and illustrations of as many species as possible.  I'm thinking not something as expensive as Glut's encyclopedia (it was just as expensive back then)..."

I just don't think that exists. I think that the internet and Wikipedia in particular have sort of killed the general information dinosaur book. That was basically Glut's 1972-1992 Dinosaur Dictionaries, later expanded into the near-perfect 1997-2008 Dinosaurs: The Encyclopedias. But no book is as good as Wikipedia for the general info, and for anything more detailed you might as well just upgrade to the primary literature which is easy to get if you know where to go. The only dinosaur books I would ever buy now are basically collections of technical articles (which is also what the upcoming third The Dinosauria edition will be), or if GSP did something like PDW or DotA again. One book that I don't think has been mentioned yet, and is more detailed and mainstream than Paul's is "Molina-Perez and Larramendi, 2019. Dinosaur Facts and Figures: The Theropods and Other Dinosauriformes. Princeton University Press. 288 pp", which has a 2020 sauropodomorph volume as well though I haven't really looked at that one.

To add to the pile of GSP Field Guide reviews, my series is_
https://theropoddatabase.blogspot.com/2010/10/princeton-field-guide-to-dinosaurs.html
https://theropoddatabase.blogspot.com/2010/10/princeton-field-guide-to-dinosaurs_07.html
https://theropoddatabase.blogspot.com/2010/10/princeton-field-guide-to-dinosaurs_08.html
https://theropoddatabase.blogspot.com/2010/10/princeton-field-guide-to-dinosaurs_14.html

Mickey Mortimer

[Nick Gardner]

Perhaps make a recommendation? Libraries often build collections based on recommendations/suggestions to develop the collection.

For your original art, have you considered reaching out to an museum-associated library or archive that would be interested in absorbing a collection like that?

[Gregory Paul]

Mickey makes a lot of good points. But books like Glut's Dinos The Ency, my PDW and DoA are very difficult to do at best. Both because of the immense work they require for pay that is less than flipping burgers at McDs. And because publishers are not interested anyhow the sales being very small. My Princeton guides are the best selling prehistoric pop book series yet done. Partly because they don't drag readers through all those specimen numbers and detailed who said what and why discussions the dedicated dinobuffs want but are not going to get. And cause people like the pics;)

GSPaul

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[Thomas Yazbek]

Wikipedia has also eroded the usefulness of many of the websites (or types of websites) that used to be more prominent back in the day. It's a good portal into the primary lit though.  

The types of paleo websites/books I am most interested in involve unique or vintage art (esp. one artist-author's unique vision - Paul, Bakker, even certain youth oriented books like McLaughlin's Archosauria or David Peters' 80s-90s books), unique personal opinions/detailed discussion (e.g. blogs - Wikipedia has nothing on this b/c of Da Rules), or unique/detailed/human-interest narratives (e.g. many a book about paleontological expeditions or periods of research, like the Bone Wars or history of collection in one region).

The artwork/photos on Wikipedia range from excellent to uselessly terrible, much like many a 90s/00s dinopedia. That inconsistency produces an effect akin to losing the suspension of disbelief while reading a flawed novel - the feeling that interpretations about fossils reflected in the artwork or, in the case of multi-author works, the prose, are in conflict.

That is why a work like PDW shines and will always be a classic despite being outdated - one author/artist pouring passion into something that doesn't feel thrown together.

Thomas

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[Gregory Paul]

Yes on looking for a place to take my art. No on their replies so far. 

GSPaul

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[Gregory Paul]

Thank you for the nice comment. 

And to those who buy my books! 

GSPaul

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[Manuel Parrado]

I just wanted to thank everyone for their suggestions.  I haven't replied to every single message so as not to clog your inboxes, but I've taken note of each of the books you have suggested to decide which ones catch my interest the most.

Best regards,

Manuel

On Thu, Jun 26, 2025 at 3:26 PM Manuel Parrado <mepa...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello, all. I hope I don't get kicked out on my first message to the group, since this is not the typical kind after browsing a few pages.

I had an intense "vertebrate paleontology phase" for a good year and a half between 2004 and early 2006.  I used to be a lurker in the old DML, and occasionally posted questions, which I was glad to learn I can still find in the reptilis.net archive.  Reviewing now my book purchase history in Amazon and looking at some of my questions posted to the DML and over old emails I was surprised to see how much I read during that brief period and how deep my interest ran at the time.  

Even though I lost the passion almost as quickly as I developed it, over the years I have very sporadically perused the web for some of the most significant recent discoveries in dinosaur paleontology. I also read Brusatte's excellent "Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs" book in 2020, and a few days ago I finished Michael Benton's wonderful "Dinosaurs Rediscovered".  This last one seems to have pushed me over the edge and made me want to rekindle my old passion.

With that background out of the way, if you have managed not to click away until now I am looking for some help catching my bearings anew in the world of vertebrate paleontology, especially dinosaurs:

Discussions:

Is the Dinosaur Mailing Group now the best place to find a confluence of experts, lay persons, and everyone in-between to ask questions and hold discussions on dinosaur paleontology?  Are there similar outlets I should consider?

Phylogenetic relationships:

Is the tree of life web (tolweb.org) still the best accessible resource to consult for our latest understanding of how all living species are related to each other?  Was it ever?  At first glance it doesn't look much different from what I remember it all those years ago and references look quite old, but it's what I used in the past.

Dinosaur Books:

I know this probably gets asked much too often, but after having sold all my old books years ago, I'm trying to assemble a new collection, especially since after 20 years the science should have progressed significantly without me :-))

Back then, the core of my knowledge was "The Complete Dinosaur" (1st Ed) - Brett-Surman et. al., 1999, but I read quite a few others that were of recent vintage at the time.

I'm considering the 2nd edition of the same book, although being from 2012 it too might be getting a bit long in the tooth, so I would appreciate advice on alternatives for another, perhaps more updated comprehensive book about dinosaur paleontology that will make me a "dangerous" amateur again.

Aside from that learning core, I would like to have a reference dinosaur book with descriptions, information and illustrations of as many species as possible.  I'm thinking not something as expensive as Glut's encyclopedia (it was just as expensive back then), so I have my eye on The Complete Book of Dinosaurs - Dougal Dixon, 2012, though perhaps that is getting old as well, so recommendations for newer and affordable reference books are welcomed.

Other Paleo Books:

Besides dinosaurs, I have alwyas also been interested in exitinct marine reptiles (specifically plesio/pliosaurs, Ichtyosaurs, and mosasaurs), pterosaurs, the history of evolution of life on earth, and I am especially fascinated with the vertebrates' transition from water to the land.

Below are the books I read "back in the day".  I could use some recommendations on newer books that cover these subjects, unless any of these books are still relevant enough that there aren't better choices available.

Sea Dragons: Predators of the Prehistoric Oceans - Richard Ellis, 2003

The Pterosaurs: From Deep Time - David Unwin, 2005

Aquagenesis: The Origin and Evolution of Life in the Sea - Richard Ellis, 2001

At the Water’s Edge - Carl Zimmer, 1999

Documentaries:

Lastly, if anybody has any recommendations for recent documentaries that are well regarded for accuracy and informational value, I'll take those too.  I've been watching and enjoying the new Walking With Dinosaurs series.  I used to own the original one and its immediate successors, and it was part of what kicked me into my first foray into dinosaurs.  I have the recent Prehistoric Planet on my list too, but I don't have Apple TV+.

My apologies for the unnecessarily long message and thank you in advance.

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[Isaac Wilson]

Thank you for writing them, Greg! I have to say that PDW was hugely influential on my career trajectory. I found a copy in a public library in elementary school, and the detail produced inside helped me realize what paleontology could be. It was tremendously exciting. Although it's an older work, it remains one of my favorites due to the clear passion you invested into the project.

Isaac

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[Gregory Paul]

Thanks for the nice thoughts! 

That book still gets cited in the literature. 

GSPaul

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[Tim Williams]

Isaac Wilson <thevi...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Although it's an older work, it remains one of my favorites due to the clear passion you invested into the project.

 

I'm quite fond of PDW, for the same reason.  

Part of me wishes that the name Avepoda did replace Theropoda - the feet are of course more bird-like than beast-like.  But we're stuck with Theropoda.  

[Gregory Paul]

Just to be clear Avepoda does not literally replace Theropoda. Or Neotheropoda (coined by Dr Bob and redefined by Paul S as I recall). Avepoda (theropods in which the 1st metatarsal does not contact the tarsals) is a subset of Theropoda (which includes four toed predaceous dinosaurs) that includes Neotheropoda, but also includes all tridactyl nonneotheropods. When people use neotheropod they are automatically excluding the basal tridactyl dinosaurs that lie below that node. Almost certainly some of the Triassic three toed trackways in the literature that are casually chucked into neotheropods actually lie basal to that which does not meet scientific standards of precision, and all Triassic tridactyl prints should be put in avepods for that reason alone. Likewise, if talking about the evolution of the tridactyl foot, using neotheropoda is off base because that does not include all three toed theropods, avepod should be used instead. Plus avepod explicitly notes the avian nature of the first appearance of the bird type foot. And it is like a cool name. 

What should have happened is for the all encompassing avepod to replace the more restrictive neotheropod in general use. Why this has not occurred I do not entirely know. Partly paleoinertia. Partly I have seen some say autopomorphy plus clade Avepoda is a junior synonym of node based Neotheropoda which is incorrect. When someone comes up with an avepod fossil that is not a neotheropod that may force the change. So get out there and keep digging girls and boys! 

About the passion I put into PDW, after completing it I was so burned out that I declined an immediate invite to do the same with sauropods. I decided to wait a couple of years to recover. In that short time the market had changed and it was a no-go. Not to fret, by now that book would be WAY out of date;)

GSPaul  

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[Tim Williams]

 'Gregory Paul' via Dinosaur Mailing Group, <DinosaurMa...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

> Just to be clear Avepoda does not literally replace Theropoda. 

Replacing Theropoda with Avepoda was initially suggested in PDW.  Opening my well-thumbed copy of PDW, from p.253: "In this regard, the name Theropoda, which means beast-footed, is most inappropriate.  Avepoda would be much better, but it is too late for that."

[Gregory Paul]

Yes. So I redeployed the name!

Actually, avepod directly in place of theropod would not be the best thing. Avepod is meant to cover the bird footed dinosaurs, and theropods include the four toed basal beasts. And of course the three toed theropods were covered by neotheropods. 

Then it hit me. Neotheropods do not include all tridactyl dinosaurs. So do a grade plus clade name that would include all of them that would finally allow Avepoda to become the go-to name for the bird-like dinosaurs. And I could publish it in my academic publisher DoA. 

That would work out just great. Or not. 

In angled, time independent, cladograms, not including Avepoda is not a direct problem. But in the cladistics over time charts with the connecting lines perpendicular to the time direction (horizontal if time goes up, vertical if time goes left to right) then having neotheropods at the base of the tridactyl theropods is awkward. Where then are the basal avepods on the chart? 

GSPaul

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[Richard W. Travsky]

 

I suppose this means my 1988 Touchstone/Simon&Schuster copy of PDW (great dedication to your great-aunt, BTW) and 1972 Citadel Press copy of "the dinosaur dictionary" are collectors' items and I should lock them up?

 

From: 'Gregory Paul' via Dinosaur Mailing Group <DinosaurMa...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Monday, June 30, 2025 9:28 AM
To: dinosaurma...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [DMG] Looking for a bit of help getting back into it

 

[…]

There will never be another PDW. That was about the last era when such a book could be published by a major trade publisher (the editor Alice Mayhew also edited the Woodward and Bernstein Watergate books) and be so technical, and enjoy enough sales to allow a major advance and royalites. These days such books are only possible via academic presses such and Indiana Univ and the author gets hardly any return. And the amount of work to do all the specimen #s etc etc has become vast and impractical, and much of it is on Wikipedia anyhow. Don G's Dinosaurs The Encyclopedia will never be seen again, and he did it for little compensation. 

[…]

 

GSPaul 

 

On Monday, June 30, 2025 at 12:44:29 AM EDT, Leo Sham <drle...@gmail.com> wrote:

[…]

[Gregory Paul]

Pretty much;)

My great aunt Laurel was something of a character. She was an amateur naturalist and grade school art teacher in the center of the Salt Lake Valley to the SW of the city. When I 1st met her when 7 in summer 62, after a then epic (no interstates) drive from NoVA outside DC (dad had just put a new fangled safety device in our white Ford Falcon -- seat belts) via DinoNatlMonument, we two took a shine to one another. Also 68 and 69. A font of information, she loved driving up the Little (glacial) and the Big Cottonwood canyons in the Wasatch mountains to the immediate east of the valley, and the rolling hills to the east of them, and the High Unitas to the east of that. When mom was along the two would just chat and chat in the front bench seat. In 62 I was saying Tryannosaurus and she corrected me on that, thus the PDW dedication. In 68/69 she encouraged my early dinoart (mainly copies of the Fenton's The Fossil Book which was a big deal back then). when staying at her duplex the cool evening breeze coming off the Wasatch was wonderful. Last saw here in 78 while on the first JHU Bakker fossil expedition. She dropped me off at the Univ Utah campus to meet up with the crew at Jim (Allosaurus) Madsen's lab, last time I saw her.

GSPaul 

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[mkir...@gmail.com]

Rich, selling both books would get you a quick...$88.00.