dinosaurs dinosaurs dinosaurs we all love to see dinosaurs leisurely walking through ancient
forests spitting venomous skewered Dennis Nedry and certainly breaking free of there electrified
enclosures to terrify panicked park goers but before dinosaurs could be brought to the big
screen first the filmmakers had to know where dinosaurs came from so on this episode we're
going to take you on a journey through time that began 250 million years ago over the last quarter
century the beloved films in the Jurassic franchise have influenced and inspired a
countless number of dinosaur fanatics to become paleontologists and while we would all love to
find and excavate a dinosaur there is a great deal of knowledge that must be learned before
one can venture out into the field and search for prehistoric treasure today the Jurassic world
explorers and I are visiting the renowned Chicago Field Museum as you approached the museum Stanley
Field Hall you immediately noticed that this is the home of maximo a full skeletal cast of the
biggest titanosaur that scientists have discovered to date now in its 125th year the field museum
maintains one of the world's largest collections of artifacts and specimens yet this location
is more than just impressive displays their scientists take part in groundbreaking research
all over the world as they drive a mission to explore protect and celebrate nature and culture
for an even more in-depth education the team and I will be getting a unique opportunity to
go behind-the-scenes and into the field museums of vertebrate paleontology collections dinosaur
and oversized collections sounds like we're in the right place our goal is to take you on a
journey through the Mesozoic era known as the age of reptiles which span from 250 to 266 million
years ago and consisted of three main periods the Triassic the Jurassic and the Cretaceous I
will be getting a hands-on education by working alongside two of the museum's finest dinosaur
experts Brandon Pete cook who specializes in the evolution of vertebrates from the Triassic period
and bill Simpson a head of geological collections an organiser of the museum's extensive fossil
vertebrate collection we begin in the Triassic where Brandon will guide us along the way this
looks like one terrifying little creature from the Triassic what kind of dinosaur is this Brandon so
this animals name is a Sealy Soros Conway and I got to burst your bubble it's not a dinosaur
this is not a dinosaur this is not a dinosaur I'm off to a rough start here so far okay so
when I back up a second and I look at this thing it really looks to me like the pro Compsognathus
time period in Jurassic Park the lost world you know green ones that came out on beginning up
then attack that guy in the forest but you tell me this is not a dinosaur this is not a dinosaur this
animal is as close to being a dinosaur as you could possibly be but just sort of technically
it's not a dinosaur is it technically a reptile it is a reptile okay reptile so close to the arcus or
lineage then because we've explained this in other episodes where the dinosaurs the birds
crocodilians all split off from a common ancestor that's right and so this animal is a very close
cousin the dinosaurs so it's on the bird side of that Marcus or split Crocs over here Birds over
here it's on the bird line just like all the other dinosaurs are but this thing just technically
isn't a dinosaur but it's as close as you can be I mean it lived alongside some of the first
dinosaurs so what makes a dinosaur a dinosaur then if this is not a dynasty and that's a great
question so just like any group of animals mammals or primates or ARCA soars like you said dinosaurs
is a word that people use to describe a teeny little bit of the Tree of Life and to fit into
dinosaurs you have to have a lot of teeny little details in your Anatomy just right and so this
animal has a lot in common with dinosaurs but it's missing a hole in his hips he's missing a little
bit of bone on his ankles he's missing a little bit of length on this thing here on his arm bone
for muscles to attach and just those teeny details mean we don't call it a dinosaur but it involves
right when they do it lives alongside them it's so close it's nice and now when I look at the skull
you know it looks similar to the skull of like an iguana or maybe a monitor lizard yeah and you look
at those teeth you think yep that's not something you want to run into in a dark rainy forest is it
no maybe not but I've got to tell you something else if you look at those teeth real closely
they've got teeny little serrations on them they look like little leaves we think this guy might be
a plant eater or maybe just an omnivore really yeah not a meat eater and certainly not a big
ferocious killer so that whole scenario being attacked by the pro Compsognathus may not exist
with this creature maybe not but the thing is if you step out of your time machine and you're in
the forest with these guys you probably are gonna think it's a dinosaur and I'm not gonna fault you
for it it looks a lot like pro Compsognathus also known as the copy was a true dinosaur and they
were aggressive pack hunters despite only being the size of a chicken armed with speed incredible
jumping skills and a mouthful of razor-sharp teeth they would work as a team to isolate and
take down much larger prey very cool Thank You Brandon so much for giving us this fascinating
education of caught a creature that looks like a dinosaur but is not actually a true dinosaur so
close though man now what we're gonna do next is meet up with Bill who's gonna take us forward in
time to the Jurassic period we're gonna take a look at some bones from some of the icons
you recognize from the Jurassic franchise and definitely creatures that we can consider true
dinosaurs the Triassic period span between 252 and 201 million years ago and while it probably gave
rise to the dinosaurs all the true Giants that we recognize from the films actually began to
appear in the Jurassic period which lasted from 201 to 145 million years ago here over to this
that's pretty cool right hey nice to finally meet you thank you for having us today here to
the underbelly the archives of the Chicago Field Museum this is what we call oversized
storage where all the dinosaurs are - yes now I just worked with Brandon and we looked at a
creature from the Triassic period very early you're gonna lead us into the Jurassic and the
Cretaceous yeah let's see you some good stuff okay sounds good bill oversees the care of each
and every fossil in this vast archive so when we told him that we wanted to see some Jurassic icons
he knew exactly where to start all right yeah Wow sauropod bones and I can already see that it says
Brachiosaurus and this is gonna be cool so I'll take my end out first and then you follow okay
it's a dinosaur all right crazy look at that bone holy mackerel that is big and how cool is this
getting to see a bone from one of the most iconic dinosaurs from the Jurassic franchise certainly
as you guys know it is the first dinosaur the grant Saturn Malcolm saw as they arrived at
Jurassic Park the Brachiosaurus if you were to stand beside a Brachiosaurus and look up the
crest of its head would reach 40 feet into the air making it the tallest dinosaur in Jurassic world
these gentle giants were considered social curious and fearless in the face of predators as their
massive size was a primary means of defense now I heard you calling it brachiosaur so I've thrown
up moaning is Brock you know there's no right pronunciation they're both fine okay brachiosaur
sprockie om Greek for armed okay this this name means armed lizard and it's in reference to the
fact that unlike almost all other sauropods that have shorter front limbs and hind limbs
brachiosaur was the first one found that had long front limbs okay that's the name brachiosaur now
what bone is it that we're looking at here this is actually the right femur the right thigh bone
okay the head would be here fits into the hip socket and then that would be part of the knee
okay and how much does this bone weight because even moving it on this cart yeah it's about a
half a ton okay six and a half feet long and yeah that's crazy let's do this I'm gonna lay down next
to it just so you guys can get some scale as to how big it really is now I'm about five foot ten
so that's bigger than I am isn't it oh yeah Zack we are recreating the fellow who discovered breeki
asaurus did exactly this out in the field in 1900 and we have a picture of him next to it
so cool I have never laid hands on a fossil like this before nothing this big and it's incredibly
dense yes I'm believing it's a bit flattened but yes very dense bill I've heard that actually this
particular fossil has some historical significance you tell us a little bit about that yeah when you
find a new organism of any kind plant animal extinct living you get to make up the name for
it you publish a very detailed description of it and you designate one official example the
physical definition of your new organism that's called a Howlett type pulla types or the rocks
of the Natural History Collection this bone along with those behind us are the holotype
of brachiosaur as' very cool as we know the breaky source was an herbivore a veggie Saurus and as we
move forward into the cretaceous period thinking we can get some carnivore fossils up close for
the cameras yeah let's go see some all right guys let's go take a look at some meat eaters
Brachiosaurus will forever stand tall as one of the Jurassic franchise's most beloved dinosaurs
whether using its 30 foot neck to reach leaves in the treetops or displaying its massive 56
tons of power by simply walking through a scene we never fail to admire this Titan
with childlike wonder the Jurassic period was certainly rich with dinosaurs yet some of the
most recognizable stars were actually running the planet 145 to 66 million years ago during
the Cretaceous period and while land dwelling dinosaurs have commanded a fair share of screen
time Jurassic fans now have a prehistoric predator that haunted beneath the waves
revealing the Cretaceous period all right there we go wheat so we've got a variety of different
Cretaceous animals here but if you want to see a carnivore we've got one right here oh yes guys
check this out that's Mosasaurus right now this is a Moses or a Han an aquatic lizard so it's
not at all a dinosaur not a dinosaurs song the whole other side of the reptile tree okay now
is this something that I can hold on to you let me get the skull out and I can show you that is
impressive now did you guys find this like this completely articulated no this one was actually
donated to the museum okay help me support it I'll turn it right-side up put your hands
under the snout maybe a little closer in yep okay yeah it's heavy most mosasaurs are fairly
two-dimensional they're flattened this one has been expanded out so it's a fairly 3-dimensional
that is cool and see the sclerotic ring the bones inside the eye yes at over 70 feet in length the
parks Moses or Hales as the largest carnivore in Jurassic world and far surpasses anything that
we have seen Recker and while it hunted the ocean during the same time period the t-rex
stalked the land this giant marine reptile is more closely related to monitor lizards than it
is to dinosaurs let's put the skull back and let's take a look at do you call these the flippers yeah
flippers paddles okay yeah there are the hands and feet of this animal look at that guy's Wow
just like an oar and you can just imagine this thing propelling itself forward at incredible
speeds and I mean do you think that they were rather quick yeah first they were yeah carnivores
yeah you bet they'd be terrified yeah now is there something that I can hold on to yeah okay
there's a beautiful little section of lower jaw in this specimen over here is it this right yeah
guys a smaller jawbone that's a little bit easier to hold onto than the full skull look at that
quite the intimidating reptile now in reptiles you have lots of bones in the lower jaw we as
mammals we're used to just having one bone but in a reptile you've got lots of different bones and
this is just one of them now like crocodilians were they constantly rejuvenating their teeth
because I see there's more teeth coming out from the jaw saw out there absolutely there's
I consider this a small one I mean in the movie there's so much bigger yeah there's
a huge diversity in size in this group because it's a big group there are small ones this is a
middle sized one the one in the movie obvious I think it goes without question the Moses or
certain is one intimidating predator and as we know at the end of Jurassic world fallen
Kingdom we got a couple sneak peeks as to this creature existing now amongst the humans and I
know we're all really excited to see where the next film is going to take us well it certainly
was an honor for myself and the crew to be here going behind the scenes at the Chicago
Field Museum bill thank you so much on this trip through time from the Triassic to the Jurassic and
finally the Cretaceous period I'm coyote Peterson be brave stay wild we'll see on the next Jurassic
world adventure the science of paleontology has provided us all with a gateway into the
past and when combined with the art of filmmaking it's easy to see why the results have captivated
generations of dinosaur fanatics in its own right the Jurassic franchise is responsible
for encouraging countless Minds to follow their dreams into these respective fields by embracing
this very notion the renowned Chicago Field Museum strives to inspire discovery and spark
public engagement with art and science helping to bring these dreams to reality if you love
the Jurassic franchise as much as we do then make sure to go back and watch the films from Universal
home entertainment that sparked an adventure 65 million years in the making this collection is
now available on blu-ray DVD and digital download hey dinosaur fans make sure to subscribe and click
the notification valve so you can join the Jurassic world explores next week as we go
behind the scenes with soo the world's largest and most complete Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton