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Baby Keichousaurus


Crazyhen

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Please take a look of the baby Keichousaurus below, its skull looks a bit different from others.  Is it because the upper jaw and lower jaw were displaced and so the skull appears like that, or would this be a different species?  I understand from local collectors there that this form is much rarer than the normal form.

 

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The normal forms are below:

 

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If it is a very young baby, perhaps the skull would be softer and deform more easily during the fossilization process ? 

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Having a difficult time trying to see a normal skull reshaping itself into that club shape.  The  body shape also looks different than other K. hui is it possible it's just a different species.  If that form occurs periodically with a consistent club shaped skull would that argue against it being due to fossilization. 

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47 minutes ago, Troodon said:

Having a difficult time trying to see a normal skull reshaping itself into that club shape.  The  body shape also looks different than other K. hui is it possible it's just a different species.  If that form occurs periodically with a consistent club shaped skull would that argue against it being due to fossilization. 

Very true, Troodon, that might be possible.  If the jaws are not displaced, the skull is of a quite different shape than K. hui.  This is very interesting.  The local also calls it ‘big headed dragon’.

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First foto is from embryonal Keich, see LIN&RIEPPEL "Functional Morphology of Keichousaurus" pg. 21 fig. 15.

Shape of body is usual like this with embryonic Keichs, size of head is too.

Shape of skull is unusual, never saw that before. But easy to assume, that this is related to preservation, since this embryonic skull is very fragile and only a few pressure woul be enough to deform it. The more they are getting adult, the more ossification of the scull takes place and making it more stable.

I think, there's plenty of literature by O.Rieppel et al. concerning ontogeny of Keichs.

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9 hours ago, RJB said:

Would love to see it after prep!

 

RB

The local collector told me that baby keichs can only be prepped by acid washing and no one would do it as it’s very easy to dissolve the delicate bones of the baby.  I suppose it could only be prepped using very professsional equipment.

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