This Collared Lizard has nothing to do with the comment contest; but he makes an awful nice picture.
Currently we have 32,081 comments in the pot, and we’re shooting for 35,000. From time to time I’ll give you the current total, in hopes of stimulating witty conversation. I wonder how long it’ll take to get there. We shall see.
(And of course the first thing I see, after I post this, is a “Comments are disabled” message. *Sigh* That’s no way to run a comment contest. So I’ll fix it now.)
The winner will feel joy as bright as the blue on that lizard. 🙂
The coloring on the Collared Lizard reminds me of the artwork my wife does on one of her apps where she chooses the color to fill in on the drawing presented. Made in the image of God, we are artists.
The male Colored Lizard really does have all those bright colors–especially in mating season.
Got it!
He’s a beauty. I suspect God was having a bit of fun when He colored that one!
As many/most of the dinosaurs were also reptiles, I wonder if the males were also such bright colours in mating season. In these unrealistically premised fiction movies Hollywood loves making, the animals are always perfectly camouflaged, but maybe that is as much fiction as the rest of their stories…
To the best of my knowledge, the colors they use in those illustrations are pure conjecture.
Popular culture is an unreliable guide to dinosaurs. Two examples from “Jurassic Park” (I love that movie, but these are too much): Dilophosaurus spits poison, and has a threat display, like a giant frilled lizard; and Tyrannosaurus can’t see you unless you move.
I believe Michael Crichton, who doubtless knew what he was doing, invented those details to demonstrate how little we know about dinosaurs, beyond their bones and trackways.
Bob Bakker used to call it “dino-dreck.”
I love dinosaur movies, but I know they are never unmixed with fantasy.
That’s the thing, all they have, in most cases, are some fossilized bones. A lot can be determined from bones, but there’s a lot of conjecture involved as well.
Crichton was a wonderful writer. IIRC, he was educated as an MD and then became a writer. His knowledge of science was excellent, but he wrote fiction, and he would be the first to tell you as much.
Crichton was a founding member of the Dinosaur Society. He knew as much about dinosaurs as anyone. I’m certain he made up all that stuff about Dilophosaurus just to show how limited our actual knowledge is.
And real smart raptors make for a more exciting story that stupid raptors that even a Democrat could outwit.
Well, maybe not quite that stupid…
Makes sense. I know that they portrayed the Velociraptors as moving like flocks of birds, in the movie. Accurate or not; it was a neat sight to see.
You mean, he said, Gallimimus. Trust me, I know that movie practically by heart. “Uh, they’re flocking this way!”
Inspired by a similar scene in “King Solomon’s Mines”
Here’s another comment!