When you find the bones of the dinosaurs, how do you know how old they are?

Posted by Paul Sereno on Sep-28-00, 12:19 PM (CST)
There are only two ways to know the age of the dinosaurs you're digging up. The first is to compare to rock layers with very similar dinosaurs and other animals - like fish, lizards, or other fossils like plants and clams. The second way, by dating radioactive elements. For chemical dating you need to find a layer of volcanic ash that was deposited by a volcano when the dinosaurs were alive. We are using the first method at Camp 1.

- Paul Sereno

How can you tell the difference between male and female dinosaur bones?

Posted by Paul Sereno on Sep-28-00, 12:22 PM (CST)
Actually, only in very few circumstances can we tell any difference between dinosaurs - and even if we can see a difference only a few cases where we have many skeletons of the same kind of dinosaur can we see a difference in shape or size of certain bones. One is male and one is female, but there is no way to say which is which. In many animals - and especially in mammals - females tend to be larger than males but there is no way to know that this would have been the case with dinosaurs.

- Paul Sereno

Is the Sahara Desert the hottest desert?

Posted by Gabe on Sep-28-00, 12:42 PM (CST)
The Sahara may not be the hottest desert in the world, but it is certainly the largest. It covers more than 3.5 billion square miles of Northwest Africa, but it is only inhabited by 2 million people, most of whom are nomads like the Touaregs here in Niger. It is considered a "high pressure desert" meaning the reason it is a desert here is because dry air is descending. But don't forget, deserts are not always hot. A desert is defined based on the amount of rainfall an area receives. Areas that receive less than ten inches of rain and have an evaporation rate that is higher than the amount of rain that falls is what makes a desert hot or cold. So far the hottest temperature we have experienced in the field was 144 degrees Fahrenheit in a tent and 130 degrees outside. It dropped to 55 degrees Fahrenheit one night, but most nights it cools off to a chilly 70 degrees Fahrenheit.

- Gabrielle Lyon

What do you do if you run out of water?

Posted by Paul Sereno on Sep-28-00, 12:21 PM (CST)
When someone runs out of water to drink in the desert you become pretty desperate. You can last several additional days by drinking the water from the radiator in a car (no one uses antifreeze in radiators here, just water)! We want to avoid anything like that and we would plan to leave the desert for an oasis before we ran out of water. This year we had a truck bring a large quantity of water to us and we've been storing it in water balloons. The truck was ten days late, so we made two trips to get water for camp. We were able to work without interruption, but we did get close to leaving once.

- Paul Sereno

If you retired and have kids of your own, do you want them to take your place in the project?

Posted by Paul Sereno on Sep-28-00, 12:23 PM (CST)
I would give my kids - when I have them - many outdoor experiences. The desert is a great place to see animals and plants you'd never see anywhere else. Of course, there are dinosaur bones, too. I would like to give my kids the opportunity to experience different cultures and hear different languages so that they know how big and varied the world is. - Paul Sereno

...And Adriana's mom wants to know- What is the average life span for a fully grown dinosaur?

Posted by Paul Sereno on Sep-28-00, 12:56 PM (CST)
No one knows exactly. By studying the rings in their teeth and bones, we think that most dinosaurs grew very fast, reaching adult body size after five to ten years. After that, probably many lived to 30 or 40 years, like many large reptiles do today in zoos. Keep in mind that our lifespan of about 65 years is much longer than it would be in the wild. If we had no doctors or hospitals, we would live on average, only as long as we think most dinosaurs did - about 35 years.

- Paul Sereno