A DINOSAUR

Hokitika Guardian, 28 April 1926, Page 4

A DINOSAUR

IMPORTANT DISCOVERV. |j SYDNEY. April !). L ] From about four hundredweights o y fossil bones found on the Durban , j Downs station, north of Roma, M Meber A. Longman, director of tin . Queenshul Museum, lias formed the firs herbivorous dinosaur to he discoverei ] in Australia. The discovery is unpnral ? lelccl in the Commonwealth, and. ac- > cording to Air Longman, the find i ; i I the most important since the establish- • I incut of the museum. The material . consists of 10 vertebrae from the tail . j region, some of which are very incomplete. with fragments of tiie long bones from a hind limb, and some shattered portions of the pelvic- girdle. These fossils are described by the museum as representing a gigantic herbivorous dinosaur, about 40ft in length, with dominant hind limbs and somewhat rigid tail. The large dinosaur has been named lThoetosaurus brownei, the former name being based on one of the giants of Greek mythology, “Rhoetus,” and the latter name being in honour of Mr A. J. Browne, of Durham Downs, who collected and presented the material. IMMENSE BULK. I The immense bulk of the vhoetosau- | rus may be gauged from the dimensions of the anterior tail vertebrae; which, ! when complete, were I Sin in height, about Gin in length, and weighed [ about 301 b each. The tail evidently | consisted of a rapidly-tapering series of bulky elements, and the manner in which the adjoining vertebrae are jointed to the other presents special

features which do not appear to be IJresent in dinosaurs described from other lands. A fragment of the shaft of the thigh bone had a circumference of 28in, and this bone, when complete, was probably more than oft itr length. The rhoetosaurus brownei is considered by Mr Longman to belong to the big group of herbivorous dinosaurs known as the saurpoda, and to a family in which the hind limbs were dominant. A feature of the Queensland fossil is the large size of the neural canal in the anterior vertebrae of the tail. In some dinosaurs this enlarged area has been referred ■to as a supplementary brain, and may be actually larger than the real brain, which in the giant forms- may be 30ft away. Until further remains of the Australian dinosaur are found, The size of the bead cannot be stated, but it is evident that the “tail brain*’is unusually large. Some fragments of a. small dinosaur have been previously recorded in Australia, and a single daw attributed to a carnivorous type was found in Victoria several years ago, but the Durham Downs fossils contribute the finest remains of the herbivorous dinosaurs to be discovered in Australia.