Brontosaurus is a large herbivorous sauropod from the Morrison Formation of western North America. It is represented in Prehistoric Kingdom as an alternate genus to Apatosaurus. In Prehistoric Kingdom, Brontosaurus consists of its type species, Brontosaurus excelsus.
In-Game[]
Description[]
Brontosaurus in-game is an imposing presence in any park thanks to its massive size, robust yet sleek looking build, and array of keratinous spikes along its back, neck and tail. The spikes on the underside of its neck seem to be weapons implemented in necking bouts between rival Brontosaurus, these combined with the spikes on the tip of its whip-like tail and powerful limbs come together to give this giant an intimidating array of potential weapons, and a much more rugged look than its close relative Apatosaurus.
Brontosaurus has a single skin, which has a striking pattern of branching stripes which almost resemble lightning over a cream coloured base pattern.
Management[]
TBA
In-Game Trivia[]
Nigel Marven
That sound you’re hearing isn’t thunder - it’s the earthshaking stomp of a Brontosaurus.
Nigel Marven
These dinosaur have been shaking the big screen for over a hundred years, starting with one of the first ever animated films, Gertie the Dinosaur! Gertie was never the best-behaved dinosaur, so hopefully we won’t have as much trouble keeping this Brontosaurus in line…
Paleontology[]
Brontosaurus has a long and storied history of controversy and research, going all the way back to its inception as a genus in 1879 by Othniel Charles Marsh during the infamous Bone Wars. During this period Marsh and his academic rival Edward Drinker Cope were engaged in fierce competition to name as many new animals as possible, with many taxa being named from material from the Morrison Formation. Brontosaurus was named from a partial skeleton which lacked a skull, with more specimens being uncovered as time went on. The lack of a skull led to mounted skeletons of Brontosaurus in museums often using the skulls of Camarasaurus instead to fill in the gap. This has lead many to erroneously think that Brontosaurus's longstanding invalidity was due to it being a chimera of Apatosaurus and Camarasaurus remains, when in fact the sinking of Brontosaurus into Apatosaurus was due to the high degree of similarity between the two species. The paper that synonymized the two genera was written by Elmer Riggs in 1903, with Riggs arguing that Brontosaurus excelsus should instead be a species within the genus Apatosaurus, "Apatosaurus excelsus". Despite this publication, the American Museum of Natural History chose to label the first-ever mounted skeleton of a sauropod as Brontosaurus in 1905.
Brontosaurus was near universally considered to be a junior synonym of Apatosaurus from 1905 to 2015, with only a few paleontologists such as Robert Bakker arguing that B. excelsus was distinct enough to have its own genus. This was until a study by Emanuel Tschopp, Octavio Mateus and Roger Benson in 2015 incidentally recovered Brontosaurus as being sufficiently distinct enough from Apatosaurus to warrant resurrecting the genus while conducting a detailed review of relationships between diplodocid sauropods using statistical methods. Although some remain skeptical of the return of the Thunder Lizard, nothing can change the fact that this was truly one of the most spectacular animals to ever walk the earth.
Species in the genus include the type species Brontosaurus excelsus (the "High/Noble Thunder Lizard"), B. parvus (the "Small Thunder Lizard"), and B. yahnahpin (the "Yahnahpin-Wearing Thrunder Lizard").
Paleoecology[]
Brontosaurus was an apatosaurine diplodocid sauropod that lived in the Morrison Formation alongside a multitude of other sauropods such as Apatosaurus, Diplodocus, Brachiosaurus, Camarasaurus, Barosaurus, Supersaurus, Kaatedocus, Suuwassea, Maraapunisaurus and more. This abundance of giant animals has often led to some questioning the validity of all these taxa, positing that they would simply not be able to coexist. This line of thinking has somewhat fallen out of fashion as the general sparse nature of the fossil record in general and the concept of shifting baseline syndrome have come into focus. Before human development massive herds of elephants and baffling numbers of animals were able to coexist, with pre-human ecosystems supporting much higher levels of megafauna than ever seen today. It is likely that these sauropods also fed from different resources, which would limit competition among these herbivores. Animals like Brachiosaurus would have been able to easily high browse, while animals like Diplodocus, Apatosaurus and Brontosaurus itself have been suspected to be mid to low browsers.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Brontosaurus and Apatosaurus were once in contention for title of Largest Land Animal Ever, although they were eventually superseded by the more recently discovered colossal Macronarian sauropods such as Brachiosaurus and Argentinosaurus.
- Brontosaurus and Apatosaurus are the first diplodocoids to be added to Prehistoric Kingdom, the group of "whip-tailed" sauropods which includes animals such as Diplodocus and Nigersaurus.
- Brontosaurus and Apatosaurus are mainstays of almost anything with dinosaurs in it, with 1914's Gertie The Dinosaur being the oldest known animation featuring dinosaurs. The star of the film was a sauropod named Gertie who was based off of a Brontosaurus skeleton displayed in the American Museum of Natural History.
- Other notable instances of Brontosaurus appearing in media include the original 1933 King Kong film, The Police's 1983 song "Walking in Your Footsteps" and as a frequent background animal and menu item in The Flintstones among others.
- Beyond appearances by the animals themselves, Apatosaurus and Brontosaurus have an extensive history of design inspirations, famously with the Sinclair Oil Corporation's Brontosaurus logo which went on to inspire the reoccurring Pixar background brand Dinoco.
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