Portal:Paleontology/DYK/27

...that the Natural History Museum of Berlin is home to the largest mounted dinosaur in the world, a Brachiosaurus (or Giraffatitan); and the most exquisitely preserved specimen of the earliest known bird, the Archaeopteryx?
... that Charles Darwin's final scientific book discussed the formation of mould through the action of earthworms?
... that during the MN 4 zone, the saber-toothed cat Prosansanosmilus first appeared in Europe?
... that Appianoporites, Margaretbarromyces, and Quatsinoporites are all fossil fungi from Vancouver Island, British Columbia?
... that Ororaphidia and Styporaphidia are the oldest snakeflies known from China, dating from the Middle Jurassic?

Fossilized Malagasy hippopotamus with a modern hippopotamus skull for scale

...that although no fossils of the extinct Malagasy Hippopotamus have been dated within the last 1,000 years, villagers in Madagascar described a similar creature still alive as recently as 1976?
... that one species of the extinct bivalve Similodonta was found in 108.90 metres (357.3 ft) down a Welsh borehole?
... that the hypercarnivorous crocodyliform Stratiotosuchus (pictured) from the Late Cretaceous of Brazil occupied the niche of top predator in the absence of theropod dinosaurs?
... that the extinct fly Schwenckfeldina archoica has spines on its genitalia?
... that 57 million-year-old Altiatlasius from Morocco may be the oldest fossil primate yet found, despite a molecular estimate that places the last common ancestor of primates at 90 million years ago?