Prehistoric Aussies Rule
Well I wonder just how scary the Australian landscape was
when the dinosaurs and other beasties roamed?
I suppose it would depend upon your muscles, teeth and claws –
I see Leaellynasaura shaking in her bones,
and the small Coelurosaur was the fastest on two legs
but needed more when fleeing predators!
The ferocious Allosaur could rip Labyrinthodont to shreds
when the amphibian came foolishly to shore.
Minmi paravertebra was little as a cow
but had bony plated armour under skin.
This made it hard for carnivores to sink their teeth right down,
so they’d move along – they knew they couldn’t win.
There was also a giant sauropod, herbivorous they say,
a gentle long necked, quadruped so high.
The paleontologists must have been having a bad day
when they called it Rhoetosaurus brownei.
Now the Muttaburrasaurus langdoni is a good name
to suit a creature – much like an Iquanadon,
this herbivous ornithopod’s bones have made its fame,
found near Muttaburra by a grazier, Doug Langdon.
I haven’t even touched upon the oceanic beings,
Kronosaurus queenslandicus and foe.
Long time ago the middle of Australia was all sea
and the place was just as dangerous, don’t you know!
The one I love the very most has shades of modern dolphin,
Platypterigius australia is its name.
I know, you’ll say the pronunciation is difficult to pin
and the platypus is nowhere in the game.
Above the land and sea flew winged reptiles, ugly,
long before the feathered birds emerged.
The Pterosaur cruised right along air currents, smugly
swooping down to snatch up fish on which to splurge.
Well that’s enough of prehistoric Aussies, for this day,
I hope those names are sinking in your head.
Tomorrow we will cover megafauna – no yawning –
when giant kangaroos were quite widespread .
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Gabe Feathers McGee 
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