Mesozoic Mind

Ah, Eyewitness . That 90's British natural history franchise I adore. In the libraries of the 2000's you flourished as both books and VHSs, narrated in the latter by Andrew Sachs*, and would inspire many young kid to love science and the natural world. * I will never accept the Martin Sheen Americanised versions, which I swear I didn't grow up with as a Canadian. While prehistoric life has been discussed throughout episodes (including season one's  Dinosaur , naturally), today we will focus on the season two episode  Prehistoric Life , about the evolution of animals throughout time and the study of them. The episode relays its information as a broad overview of life over Deep Time, going from: Calculating the age of the earth Stromatolites Cambrian Trilobites Dunkleosteus Carboniferous plants and insects Dinosaurs and Pterosaurs Mammals of the Cenozoic Human evolution And finally waxing about the creatures that may have never been preserved in the fossil record never to...

Ah, books. For many a palaeonerd my introduction to prehistory. So many encyclopedias, picture books, so many across libraries. Where should I start? How about with the venerable Dorling Kindsesley books from Britain, who have published plenty of education books that have helped fuel interest and love for the subject. And in particular is today's subject, DK's First Dinosaur Encyclopedia (2007), written by Caroline Bingham with input from the noted Dougal Dixon. I borrowed it from my local library, an edition from 2007. It has a few tears here and there, but otherwise is in good condition. I remember reading it at (one of) my uncle's house, with various images placed into my memories: Brachiosaurus in the desert, zebra-striped Therizinosaurus , a fishing Baryonyx , a rainbow-coloured t. rex among others. Two typical spreads of the book The book is a general overview of dinosaurs, from their biology to the Mesozoic, with a few detours for specific groups and taxa. Since thi...