Hi everyone! Kristen here for another
episode of amaze your brain at home with
the Perot Museum of Nature and Science. This week's topic: Paleo.
No, not the Paleo Diet.
Paleontology. Paleontology is the study
of past life here on earth.
So how can a paleontologist study past
life if it's extinct? They use fossils. Fossils
are the remains of plants and animals
like bones. But that isn't the only kind
of fossil there's also molds, and casts,
and impressions, such as plants. Dinosaurs
can also leave trace fossils like
footprints, skin impressions, or coprolite
(fossilized scat) that let you know they
were there. All of these little clues
come together to give paleontologists a
brief glimpse at what the environment
may have looked like. When I said
paleontology, I bet you thought we were
gonna talk about dinosaurs and you're
right! So try to find your toy dinosaurs
and I'll try to find mine. Lucy! Can you
help me find my dinosaurs?
I'll take that
as a no. Thanks.
I wasn't able to find any
toy dinosaurs so I'm gonna use images
instead. Everybody has to eat even
dinosaurs, so we're gonna follow the food
and create a food chain using our
prehistoric creatures. Our journey back
in time begins with the Sun. The Sun
provides energy to plants such as the
conifer tree or shrubs and bushes too.
Plants are called producers they use
energy from the Sun to create their own
food. Some animals prefer to eat plants.
Do you remember the name for plant
eaters? That's right an herbivore!
Tenontosaurus is an herbivore. This
will also be our first consumer or
primary consumer in our food chain.
Animals are called consumers because
they cannot make their own food they
have to consume or eat it like us.
Tenontosaurus gained energy from consuming
the plant. Our secondary consumer is
Acrocanthosaurus. He's a carnivore. What
does a carnivore eat? That's right, meat!
Acrocanthosaurus gained energy from
consuming Tenontosaurus. And then I
want to add one more consumer our
tertiary consumer or deinonychus. now we
just made a food chain and the arrows
represent energy flowing through the
ecosystem but a true ecosystem isn't
this linear. If we keep adding to our
food chain it becomes a food web.
convalesce aureus is an herbivore so
he'll gain energy from the conifer tree.
This area also had a shallow sea that
was rising and falling along with
coastal swamps. So crocodilians, or
crocodiles, and their relatives also
lived here. He could have eaten either of
our herbivores. Now let me rearrange some
things here
deinonychus could have also consumed
Conville asaurus. And who knows a
pterosaur may fly by for a snack.
Food webs are so fun to make there's no
technical right or wrong answer for them
as long as you start with the Sun, have
herbivores eating plants and carnivores
eating meat you can go in almost any
order. Thanks for helping me make a food
web with dinosaurs today. If you don't
have dinosaurs try this with any other
plants and animals that you have at home.
Thanks for taking a step back in time
with me. Bye!
