Walking With Dinosaurs Remastered

New Blood

Imagine if you could travel back in time, before humans, even before the saber tooth cats and mammoths of the Ice Age. Before the whales, sheep, and pigs of our day, to a time when reptiles ruled the planet.

93 Million Years Ago

We have arrived in a period known as the Cretaceous, believe it or not, we're actually looking at what will become the Sahara desert, but at this time, it is a series of interconnected, brackish swamps, ruled, by dinosaurs. These strange looking creatures are ouranosaurus, they are dominant herbivores in this region of Africa, living in herds up to 30 strong, they look helpless due to their lack of horns or other armor, but they use their pure strength to fight off predators. But this is nowhere close to the beginning of their story, in fact, this is actually towards the end of it. To see the start, we need to travel back further.

197 Million Years Ago

105 million years earlier, every continent is mashed together into a gigantic supercontinent called Pangaea, surrounded by a single, global ocean. This is when dinosaurs were just beginning to take hold, a mass extinction 3 million years prior has cleared out most niches, which the dinosaurs are ready to claim. A dilophosaurus patrols the shoreline, searching the beach for carcasses washed up by the sea. Still, this guy is far from the first of his kind, to see some of the earliest dinosaurs, we need to go about 5 million years before this.

Chapter 1: New Blood

202 Million Years Ago

Location: Eastern North America

This is the Triassic period, a time full of strange creatures all wrestling for supremacy. Over 50 million years beforehand, a mass extinction had wiped out over 90% of all life, the earth is still recovering, and its fauna are still trying to figure out who will be the new top dogs. Here, dinosaurs are just one of the many competitors vying for that apex position. One of the more obscure creatures from this time is this smilosuchus, a type of phytosaur, despite appearances, it is only distantly related to the familiar crocs and gators of our day, though they evolved from the same ancestors. Phytosaurs, dinosaurs, crocodilians, and pterosaurs are all members of the archosaur, or "ruling lizard", family. Archosaurs first appeared in the Permian period, managed to muscle their way through the Great Dying, and split into a multitude of different species. Pseudosuchians like postosuchus and saurosuchus, pterosaurs like pteranodon and quetzalcoatlus, crocodilians, I.e, caimans and gharials, the phytosaurs, and of course the dinosaurs. Of these, only 2 survived until the present day, crocodilians, and dinosaurs in the form of birds. For now though, phytosaurs are the apex predators of their ecosystem. However, these croc-like creatures have a softer side as well. This female has recently laid a clutch of eggs, for the next 3 months, she will diligently guard her underground nest, only leaving to get the occasional drink. However she has to face many challenges, predators are waiting around every corner for her to slip, for her to leave so they can get a free meal. Even the environment is against her, it is the beginning of the dry season, meaning scorching temperatures and no rain to soothe them. The smilosuchus do this on purpose, that way the eggs hatch exactly as the wet season is starting up, and therefore the hatchlings don't have to deal with the dry season until they are older and stronger.

Elsewhere on the fern prairies, dinosaurs are showing the first signs of their future supremacy, gojirasaurus, these guys are the first truly big theropods, which is how they got their name, because they tower over most things around them, just like the famous movie monster. Gojirasaurus are very territorial animals, holding on to territories hundreds of miles in area. Usually in the wet season, holding on to their turf is pretty easy, but in the dry season, some gojirasaurus intrude on other's territories in search of water and prey. This big male is the boss, but only time will tell for how long, he suddenly perks up as a series of bellows sounds from over the hill. It's herd of placerias, despite appearances they are not dinosaurs, but rather are more closely related to mammals like us. But these animals are remnants of a bygone age. Before the Permian extinction, there were lots of these mammal-like reptiles lumbering across the landscape, but they were hit the hardest by The Great Dying, and struggled throughout the Triassic. Now, the placerias are one of the only representatives left of this great lineage, however for the gojirasaurus, they are just food.