The giant Temnodontosaurus at Kloster Banz The centrepiece of the Petrefaktensammlung Museum Kloster Banz in a former monastery in Bad Staffelstein, Bavaria, Germany, is the 2.3 m long skull of the ichthyosaur Temnodontosaurus trigonodon. This specimen is one of the earliest fossils of its kind ever discovered. However, it comprises more than just the skull.
Platypterygius hercynicus – One of the Most Complete Cretaceous Ichthyosaurs Platypterygius hercynicus is one of the most complete ichthyosaurs known from the Cretaceous. The holotype specimen was discovered in December 1940 in a mine called Schachtanlage Georg near Gitter, now part of Salzgitter in northern Germany. The fossil was found at a depth of 100
Friedrich von Huene’s Megalosaurid Vertebra from the Lower Jurassic of Northern Germany In the 1960s, renowned Tübingen-based palaeontologist Friedrich von Huene was given the opportunity to study an incomplete vertebra from the Lower Jurassic (Toarcian) of northern Germany. The specimen had been found in the gravel pit Forst Hagen in Ahrensburg near Hamburg. The vertebra
Lindwurmia thiuda – The Most Complete Plesiosaur from the Lowermost Jurassic of Germany In January 2004, I had the opportunity to study a plesiosaur skeleton housed at the Museum Heineanum in Halberstadt, Germany. The specimen originates from the lowermost Lower Jurassic (the lower Hettangian), making it one of the oldest known Jurassic plesiosaurs from Germany.
Protoceratops andrewsi at the American Museum of Natural History In 2023, I had the opportunity to study plesiosaur material at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York. While there, I took some time to explore the rest of the exhibits. In the Hall of Ornithischian Dinosaurs, there’s a historic mount of two
