Sunday, September 08, 2013

clade

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I'm not only learning a lot of anatomy in Dinos 101: Dinosaur Paleobiology, I'm learning a lot of vocabulary, too.

We learned that one group of ornith(bird)ischian(hipped) dinos includes hadrosaurs and iguanodons.  I went to look up whether that is "iguanodon" or "iguanodonT"

I discovered that "Iguanodontia is a clade of herbivorous dinosaurs that lived from the Middle Jurassic to Late Cretaceous. Some members include Camptosaurus, Callovosaurus, Iguanodon, Tenontosaurus, and the hadrosaurids or 'duck-billed dinosaurs'."

Okayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy.....  We know from the lecture that the group includes hadrosaurs and iguanodons (no T, apparently), but ... what's a "clade"????


"A clade (from Ancient Greek κλάδος, klados, "branch") or monophylum (see monophyletic) is a group consisting of an ancestor and all its descendants, a single "branch" on the "tree of life".[1]"

(Both quotes from Wikipedia.).


I am learning stuff right and left!  That makes me happy................

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In Archaeology's Dirty Little Secrets we had a poetry corner in the fora.  (I contributed a couple of limericks and a haiku.  I should probably publish them here, one day....)  There are a lot of people from DLS in dino class, and today someone opened a poetry corner in the dino fora.  I have contributed a limerick:

What I knew about breathing was lacking.
In Biology I must have been slacking.
I was clear that birds flew,
but ... air sacs?  Who knew?
I'll catch up, but I'd better get cracking!


Now I'm thinking I have to write something that includes the word "clade"............

Because it's cool, and it's new (to me), and it rhymes with a lot of words!

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