What dinosaurs REALLY looked like 🦖
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Morning T-Rex!
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f72c8f3913cc56f9aa4_DINOSAURS_GIF.gif)
When I say dinosaur, you think of something like this right?
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f704a830e06d8adcd61_Illustration-DINOSAURS_1.png)
But the thing is… Dinosaurs probably didn't look like this.
They actually they looked more like this:
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f70f8c90f1d71197faa_Illustration-DINOSAURS_2.png)
Lemme explain…
We’ve all seen Jurassic park or some Dinosaur documentary, where all the dinosaurs are big, scaly, bony reptile with sharp teeth.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f722a9e714cc0ce708b_Illustration-DINOSAURS_3.png)
But a LOT of that is just guess work.
Think about it…
Imagine you're a dinosaur roaming around about 66 million years ago.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f6f3b78c3550fe98148_Illustration-DINOSAURS_4.png)
And then, you die (for whatever reason).
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f70e95d0a1f62d3839d_Illustration-DINOSAURS_5.png)
What happens to your body?
Well, over time some of it would be eaten.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f71b297f579e831a0bb_Illustration-DINOSAURS_6.png)
A lot of your skin, muscle and fat would decompose.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f70fc09a6a6a67dcb0a_Illustration-DINOSAURS_7.png)
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f6fed8e4bcf6925c2b3_Illustration-DINOSAURS_8.png)
And your remaining bones would slowly be buried under centuries of soil..
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f6f6111cc6b94a4d972_Illustration-DINOSAURS_8b.png)
Only for some archaeologist dude to dig you up 66 million years later.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f70725edf4ae62cf05b_Illustration-DINOSAURS_9.png)
Ok… but what survived?
Literally just your bones.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f6ff8c90f1d71197eba_Illustration-DINOSAURS_10.png)
All muscle, fat, rolls of skin, color, and feathers are all gone…
For example, if we took today's animals, and drew them based purely off of the skeletons they would leave behind… What would we see?
Well an Elephant would look like this:
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f72c8f3913cc56f9a85_Illustration-DINOSAURS_11.png)
A zebra would look like this:
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f7147b6c2d43fa4f65d_Illustration-DINOSAURS_12.png)
And a swan would look like this:
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f71f90e4678eb77b58f_Illustration-DINOSAURS_13.png)
Get what I mean?
All the squishy, gooey, soft stuff that makes these animals who they are, gets lost to time.
Cause it doesn’t preserve well like bones do.
This means Dinosaurs probably had a much more soft tissue, fatter bellies, skin flaps, lips, bumps, and lots of colorful feathers.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f700373b9f9a8eea304_Illustration-DINOSAURS_14.png)
We know this because some super smart scientist dudes recently figured out that feathers leave traces on the bones of today's feathered animals.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f70baa60458d33c149f_Illustration-DINOSAURS_15.png)
Telling us what color these feathers were.
The cool part is that we can find those exact same traces on some dinosaur skeletons too.
For example we know that Sinosauropteryx had a striped tail.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f708d1c572aae73cf2e_Illustration-DINOSAURS_16.png)
We know Beipiaosaurus had brown feathers.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f7038885ac2b5787fd4_Illustration-DINOSAURS_17.png)
And we know Anchiornis huxleyi was white and black with red feathers around its head.
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/649aa49e57793ed61ecbd3fd/66a19f704be21618a271fef4_Illustration-DINOSAURS_18.png)
But that's just what we know (which is not a lot).
Think about how colorful and varied birds are today, dinosaurs were likely very similar.
Stay Cute,
Reece, Henry & Dylan 🌈
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