Psittacosaurus tragedy
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Pirate modeHere's a spectacular fossil assemblage from the Lower Cretaceous of China, a single adult Psittacosaurus surrounded by 34 juveniles, all in a 0.5m2 area.
Adult and juvenile Psittacosaurus in plan view. Erosion has truncated several skeletons, including the adult, on the left and upper sides of the specimen. Skeletons in the centre sit topographically lower than those at the perimeter, suggesting an original basin-like feature. One skeleton at lower right appears to be draped over an edge of this structure. The absence of internal sedimentary structures makes it impossible to discern whether the basin topography is the result of sedimentary, biological or post-depositional deformational processes. Juveniles not adjacent to the adult generally lie subparallel to one another, showing no preferred orientation of the cranial end. Sediment texture and composition do not vary across the site, eliminating the possibility of a composite specimen. Scale bar, 10 cm.
That's a lot of baby dinosaurs all in one place, and the authors conclude that this is pretty good evidence of extensive parental care in this species—and that they all died very abruptly.
Meng Q, Liu J, Varricchio DJ, Huang T, Gao C (2004) Parental care in an ornithischian dinosaur. Nature 431:145-146.
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Whoa... faaascinating...
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