It has been 4 weeks since the start of the academic year. As I mentioned in my last journals this semester I have a paleontology course. I’ve been prepared for it in terms of expectations even before I get into the University as a student. Although I knew what would happen in this course I hoped to be wrong about it. Sounds confusing, isn’t it? Let me explain.
A few decades ago when Geology-geographic department was created in the University, Paleontology as a science was literally split. I don’t know the exact reasons for this but Invertebrate and Vertebrate paleontology were located in two different departments. It seems like back then most paleontologists decided that vertebrate animals are job for zoologists and not geologists. In my opinion this was strange and plain ignorant decision. Probably the reason is hiding in the fact that there are more marine sediment deposits/complexes in my country and thus fossils of marine animals are pretty common allowing pretty good possibility for stratigraphic dividing of the sediment layers by age. With the time paleontology had turned into synonym for stratigraphy. Not that there are not many fossils of vertebrate animals just most scientist doesn’t take them serious. They think about these finds more as sensation than a real science. At least I got that impression. Actually one of the most complete skeletons of the 3rd biggest land living mammal ever Deinotherium giganteum (the speciment is know as Deinotherium “traciensis” ) is found in Bulgaria. We have also one of the biggest bone beds of Hipparion in Europe and few more locations with many fossils of Miocene and Pliocene land fauna. There are even some bones thought to be from dinosaurs (still not confirmed on 100%). Anyway, all this is not enough reason for the people in GG department to study more vertebrates. Since I’m student in GG, I’m bound to study invertebrates which are far, far away from my interests in paleontology. Although I understand pretty well the importance of the invertebrate organisms (marine or land living) for the ecosystems and life as a whole I don’t have to like them. It’s not nice when 90% of all examples during the lectures regard marine environments and organisms such as bivalvias (spelling?) brachiopods, gastropods, foraminifers, etc. I realized that if I really want to specialize in Vertebrate paleontology someday I’ll have to move into Biology department or stay in GG and fight for something that I’m not sure worth it.
Anyway, it’s still a little bit early for such thoughts. For the moment I have other things annoying me more. First is the fact that all 15 years I have been interesting in paleontology can’t help me much in during the course. It’s true that I already know many things we’re studying about but when it comes to invertebrate’s classification and relationship between the different families and orders I’m nothing. I feel like a total noob. On the bright side I learnt more about taphonomy, classification and nomenclature (I knew some things as occurrences but not and like terms). If not else I could use some of the new learn stuff for better understanding of the dinosaurs. The second annoying thing is the fact that while my teachers are fine experts on their field of paleontology they make mistakes and get some things wrong while they are talking about vertebrates, especially when these vertebrates are from the Mesozoic. Here is where the problem comes. I can’t keep my mouth shut and always try to correct them which make me look like a smartass. So far I’ve corrected them and tried to have conversation twice- once on exercises and once during lectures. I’ll try to paraphrase both situations.
During exercises:
“A good example for this type of fossils is the well preserved feathers of Archaeopteryx. As you may know it’s the first bird.” teacher said.
“Archaeopteryx is actually a dinosaur.” I said.
She looked at me and then said “This animal is transitional form. It has both characteristics of a reptile and bird. That’s why it’s accepted in the science as the first bird- the missing link between reptiles and birds”.
I was about to point out that dinosaurs are not exactly reptiles in terms of similarities with modern reptiles but I didn’t say it.
“But birds are actually theropod dinosaurs and if you’re going to refer to Archaeopteryx as bird then you have to say the same for animals classified as dinosaurs ( I meant other avian dinosaurs but didn’t mentioned names). There many dinosaurs showing more advanced bird characteristics but they are not considering birds. Why? It’s just not right. For paleontologists who aren’t studying dinosaurs bird could be different class of animals but for those experts devoted their career to the dinosaurs, dinosaur and bird is the same thing. Birds are just part of Theropoda.” I continued.
“I see what you mean but recently I have read a paper about Archaeopteryx and scientists say it’s a bird.” she said. (I suspect she was talking about the stupid paper that appeared few months ago written by some ornithologists and not paleontologists.)
“But that’s the problem. While some say it’s a bird it’s actually a dinosaur. We just need better description of the term “bird”. We have to decide what the “bird” is. There are many paleontologists around the world trying to change the current classification. It has to be decided what’s bird and what’s not.” I said.
“From where you’re taking your information?” she asked me.
“Internet mostly. I’m visiting forums and from time to time read the actual papers.”
She looked at me with face saying internet is not reliable source but didn’t voice it.
“Nobody would change the definition “bird”. It has been around for so long and no one would give up from it. I think it’s the same like the debate whether Tyrannosaurus is a hunter or scavenger. We would never know for sure.” She said and then continued talking about ichnofossils.
I didn’t see how the T. rex debate is the same as the “What’s a bird?” problem but I didn’t say anything else.
Next two weeks nothing happened until this Tuesday. We had lectures leading by another paleontologist. He was talking about philogenetic trends and to be more specific it was about how high taxons originate from unspecialized predecessors. “There are many good examples especially in vertebrates- like all flying animals. Flying reptiles, or Pterodactyls, which turned out to be a dead end lineage (hearing this I lowered my head and didn’t say anything). Or birds which originate from unspecialized running reptiles (this pushed me one step closer to the edge). Oh, and mammals which evolved from the dinosaurs (that was it, I couldn’t let it continue like that).”
My hand was in the air even before the thought about it comes to my mind, giving sign I want to say something. Unfortunately it wasn’t a question.
“Mammals didn’t evolve from dinosaurs. Dinosaurs are diapsids and mammals are synapsids. There is no way.” I said.
“Oh, yes my mistake. It’s not dinosaurs but theropods.” he said.
“Uh… theropods are group of dinosaurs.” I said quietly “Mammals evolved from mammal-like reptiles.”
He continued with the lecture and in the same moment I realized he wanted to say “therapsids” instead of “theropods”. I didn’t interrupt him again. It seemed like nobody care about the wrong information we were given.
While I understand that people can’t know everything even if they are paleontologists, I can’t accept such mistakes. If I was going to educate students then I would go with the newest discoveries and not with the out-dated info that I’ve gotten 30 years ago without checking is it still valid. Along the fact my teachers are invertebrate paleontologists main reason for their behaviour is the fact that they had wrong information when they were students (before 1989, 90% all info regarding paleontology came from Russia and Russian paleontologists weren’t the leading dinosaur experts in the world.). Now the history is repeating itself. It’s not that big deal for me but it brings an important question. How good will be my education after I graduate the University? As I already pointed out not everything said in the Paleontology course is up-to-date but I know this only because I’ve been interested in the subject since age of 5. What about the other geology disciplines where I don’t have much knowledge. Everyone could give me wrong info and I would never realize it. That’s what really annoys me. I really hope the things would get better with the time because right know I feel like all 15 years spent in learning about prehistory were for nothing. I don’t want to play the role of a smartass who is always arguing with the teachers even if I’m the one who is right about some things.

Enough with the thoughts about school stuff. I want to say few words about my future artistic plans. I’m continuing with the series of sauropod illustrations. To answer the question why I’ve drawn only sauropods last months I’ll say that these works are for project of mine. I want to write short encyclopedia (it would be digital, made on Word) about these animals and will illustrate it with my own works. I finally managed to make a list with the things I’m going to draw for this project. Here it is (not in specific order): Isanosaurus attavipachi, Vulcanodon karibaensis, Cetiosaurus axoniensis, Jobaria tiguidensis, Suuwassea emilieae, Rapetosaurus krausei, Alamosaurus sanjuanensis, Saltasaurus loricatus, Supersaurus, the Rumanian dwarf sauropod (forgot its name), Plateosaurus, Melanorosaurus, drawing with different types of sauropod’s teeth, drawing showing how our understanding about the placement of the nostrils on dinosaurs changed. I think that’s all for know. Anyway you can always expect some surprises because I could add and other species to the list. I’ll take my time with this project and could work on it in next few years.
Also, if you aren’t watching my scrap gallery yet now is the time to start doing it. Since I have to draw the invertebrate fossils were studying about (during exercises we spend one hour drawing fossils which is cool for me) I’ll upload all fast drawings in scraps. Don’t look for high quality because all sketches are made for minutes but nonetheless they could give some basic idea about what these creatures look like. If you’re interested in invertebrates stay tuned. Every time I upload something new in my gallery there will be and new works in scraps.

I want to say thanks to all of my watchers and other people who are commenting my works and giving me criticism and faves. Thank you everyone! It’s appreciated.
I noticed that I’m getting more comments lately and please excuse me for the late replies. I get online just once per two weeks and it’s really hard for me to stay up-to-date with everything. This weekend I promise to reply to all comments posted on my profile or artwork pages since my last visit here. I see that there are tons of new paleoart made by fellow paleoartists just sitting and waiting for me to take a look at it. Guys, I don’t have enough time to leave comment on each one of your deviations but by faving it I want to say that I appreciate, support and enjoy you work. Keep up the good work and once again thanks!

P.S. That’s my biggest journal entry ever and it was the first one that I actually really wanted to write. I hope it’s not too boring but I needed to share these thoughts. I’m sorry for all grammar or spelling mistakes in the text.

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