Ten News Road Trip Remix: A Prehistoric Playlist 🦖

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Ten News Road Trip Remix

Ten News Road Trip Remix: 🚙 Tracy & Ryan are cruising through Utah and visiting some of the coolest Dinosaur & History museums around. ⁠🦖 But, nothing makes the trip fly by faster than listening to some of our favorite Ten News segments on dinosaurs and ancient creatures! ✔️ We've got five fascinating facts about dinosaurs. 🐔 And, if you don't remember Laine reporting on a little dino called the chicken from H - E - double hockey sticks, we've got you covered. 🦣 Don't forget about woolly mammoths making a comeback in 2027!

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TRANSCRIPT:

Ryan Willard  0:04  

Yo, Tracy, where are you? I'm already in the parking lot of the Museum of Ancient life in Lehi, Utah.

Tracy Kaplan  0:10  

Oh, Ryan, I'm in the parking lot of the dinosaur museum in Blanding, Utah.

Ryan Willard  0:15  

Blanding, Utah? What the what?

Tracy Kaplan  0:18  

Well, this is why we don't say let's meet in the best dino museum in Utah.

Ryan Willard  0:22  

Yeah, you're probably right. But how could I have known there are so many dinosaur activities in one state?

Tracy Kaplan  0:27  

Okay, listen, new idea. Let's meet in Salt Lake City at the Museum of Natural History.

Ryan Willard  0:33  

But, Tracy that'll take so long and you know that I'm riding a scooter.

Tracy Kaplan  0:37  

Well, I have a good idea for how to make the time fly by I'll send you some of our best Ten News segments on dinosaurs and ancient creatures.

Ryan Willard  0:45  

Okay, that actually sounds pretty great. Send it on over, Kap. I'm Ryan Willard. That's Tracy Leeds Kaplan and this is a Ten News Road Trip Remix. 

Sound Bit  0:55  

10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

Bethany Van Delft  1:04  

From feathers to tails and bones to fossilized poop. Paleontologists have uncovered tons of secrets about dinosaurs. With so much science we could go on for 65 million years. But for now, let's run down this list of five fascinating finds. Number one, a tale trapped in time, a paleontologist may dyno history when he found a feathered dinosaur tail trapped in amber. individual feathers had been found before but never attached to a skeleton. While this may sound like a scene from Jurassic Park, you won't find any dinosaur DNA... Number two, digging through dyno dung sounds gross, but fossilized poop, called coprolites has taught us so much. Cover lights are actually pretty rare, but by examining the fossils that have been found, paleontologists have been able to discover way more about the ancient ecosystems that this prehistoric Cooper's lived in. Number three, their true colors. Using high-tech microscopes, paleontologists can now see teeny tiny details of dinosaur feathers and skin. And by comparing these structures with those and living animals, scientists have been able to tell what Colors Dinosaurs might have been. Wow, the first dinosaur to be recreated in full color was a chicken-sized feathered dinosaur called Ubirajara. It had black and white patterns and a big bright red head. Number four, snow days. Dinosaurs having a snowball fight seems pretty crazy. I know, but actually, there were polar dinosaurs. No way. Paleontologists have found all sorts of fossils recently that show that some dinosaurs stayed in the snow year-round. Other suggests they may have made burrows during the coldest seasons. Smart. Number five, super swimmer. Nope, it's not a shark. It's a Spinosaurus the first semi-aquatic dinosaur ever discovered Spinosaurus had a huge sail on its back and a tail that looks like a giant oar. Paleontologists think they use it like a paddle to swim and chase down its prey. Who wants to dive in first?

Tracy Kaplan  3:45  

Isn't it cool to think of dinosaurs playing in the snow? 

Ryan Willard  3:48  

Yeah, I can imagine a T-Rex ripping the guts out of a smaller dino and the blood' flying everywhere turning the snow red.

Tracy Kaplan  3:55  

Oh, wow. Ryan that is dark.

Ryan Willard  3:58  

That's just how life was in the Mesozoic. It was a dino eat dino world.

Tracy Kaplan  4:02  

That reminds me. Do you remember Laine reporting on a little dino called the chicken from H E double hockey sticks?

Ryan Willard  4:08  

No way. I gotta hear this!

Laine Farber  4:23  

Have you ever looked at an ostrich and thought, Man, I wish this bird was bigger, more ferocious, and armed with long razor-like claws? If so, then you're in luck because such a creature does exist. Well, did exist. Standing at 10 feet tall and weighing roughly 650 pounds. The feathered dinosaur once roamed our planet. Yikes. Paleontologists have been intrigued by the bird-like dinosaur nicknamed the chicken from hell since its discovery in 1998. And now it was in the news once again following a very successful fossil dig at the Hell's Creek Geological Formation. This past summer, a team of paleontologist volunteers, teachers and students successfully unearthed the fossilized remains of four different dinosaurs. Amongst the fossils were a pelvis, toe claw, and limbs that closely resembled those of Anzu. Okay, so why is this such a big discovery? Well, into fossils are rare, scientists have only found a few different specimens of the dinosaur preserved in our fossil records. unearthing more bones could result in the first complete anzu skeleton. And who wouldn't want to see that in the Smithsonian? They're like stretched-out chickens with knife fingers. Incredible. So we can all agree that more anzu representation and our national history museums would be rad. But scientists have a unique interest in the dinosaur that goes beyond its interesting looks. Paleontologists love the ant zoo because its existence highlights the fascinating connection between dinosaurs and birds. Now, this fact might blow your mind. But dinosaurs and birds are related. In fact, they are so closely related that modern-day birds are classified as avian dinosaurs. No way. Yes, you heard that correctly. Birds are a type of dinosaur just like humans are a type of primate, geese, sparrows, flamingos, penguins, all dinosaurs. Sounds crazy, but it's true. Birds are the closest living relatives to theropod dinosaurs. theropod dinosaurs were bipedal meaning they walked upright on two feet and included ferocious predators like the T-Rex and velociraptor. So what does the anzu have to do with all this bird business? Well, anzu was a very birdie theropod that lived during the late Cretaceous era. It had feathers, a beak, and taloned feet. Despite this, and do was not a true bird. It had arms instead of wings, a heavy skeleton, and a long bony tail. In other words, there was no way that anzu was taking to the sky well. Though they weren't true birds, the anzu and other similar theropods, evolved alongside some of the first species of prehistoric birds. The fact that these very different animals evolved to feature some of the same traits suggests that something from the environment during this time made bird-like traits favorable. In other words, animals that had bird-like traits that lived during that time period did really well. Way to go. theropods. Like a Zoo. We were headed for bird dumb when the asteroid struck our planet, killing off 75% of life on Earth, including all nonavian dinosaurs, like Anzu. So who knows what have happened if that six-mile-wide space rock had flown past our orbit? Maybe we would see lighter versions of a scissored-fingered chicken from hell flying around our neighborhoods today.

Ryan Willard  8:12  

Wow, I am glad we have normal chickens and that there aren't any actual dinosaurs alive today.

Tracy Kaplan  8:17  

Well, hold that thought, Ryan. There's a company working to bring back extinct creatures.

Ryan Willard  8:22  

What? Like Jurassic Park? 

Tracy Kaplan  8:25  

Sort of, but they're starting with a creature humans once lived alongside the woolly mammoths.

Bethany Van Delft  8:39  

If you are a big fan of the Ice Age movies, maybe you've wondered what it might be like to hang with the real, live woolly mammoths, these cousins of the modern elephant, you know the ones with huge tusks and thick fur haven't been gone that long. They lived as recently as 4000 years ago. And now a new bioscience company has said they're trying to bring them back using genetic engineering. What you heard me right, a company called colossal which means huge has given themselves the really huge task of bringing back the mammoth by 2027. How will they do it with genetics? The idea for classes started in the laboratory of George Church, a biologist at Harvard. He along with others, who researched history used genetic tools they invented to pinpoint the differences between a mammoth and their closest living relative, the Asian elephant. What they found were 60 genes that controlled everything from having more fat. So mammoths can survive in the Arctic, to the mammoths, distinctive fur and domed head. So to bring back a mammoth, all they need to do is start with the not yet born elephant. Remove the genes that make it an elephant Emre Place them with those mammoth genes. Sounds easy right? Help. Not really. Their big idea also comes with huge problems to overcome. Mammoths are hard to work with because they're so big to grow a baby Mammoth and a test tube would take two years, and it could weigh more than 200 pounds. No one has ever done this with an elephant, never mind a mammoth. Most other scientists don't believe they can pull this off. But regardless of whether they can create a mammoth or not, the founders argue that the process is worth learning about researching how to bring back mammoths might help develop new techniques for species that are endangered, giving them a genetic boost to adapt to climate change or fight disease. That's great. This is cool research and I sure hope they can help endangered animals, but this definitely sounds a little too close to Jurassic Park for my tastes.

Ryan Willard  11:14  

Whoa, that's so cool. One day soon we can be hanging out with woolly mammoths.

Tracy Kaplan  11:18  

Hey, Ryan. I'm pulling into the museum now.

Ryan Willard  11:20  

Perfect. Me too. I can't wait to see fossils galore.

Tracy Kaplan  11:24  

And Ryan, remember to do an outro.

Ryan Willard  11:29  

I'm on it, Kap. But first, here's a quick note for the grownups. This has been a Ten News Road Trip Remix. Technically, we're off for the summer, but look out for our road trip remixes and re-airing of some of our favorite episodes all summer long. I'm Ryan Willard, and thanks for listening to the Ten News. Hope you're having a great summer and staying cool, kind, and informed.