Towards the end of the jurassic period, the 2 supercontinents, Laurasia and Gondwana started falling apart creating more smaller continents. When the Cretaceus period begun the Earth slowly started to look like the one we live on now. There were still some major diffirences though. In the Early Cretaceus Africa was still connected to South America and India was a subcontinent. Most of Europe was underwater, there were some larger islands here and there. Speaking of Europe, this is where we'll go today. Great Britain to be exact. We're going to follow the life of a dinosaur whose name means The heavy claw.
This is the Wessex formation, 130 millions of years ago.
This starts playing
We watch this boi fly.
We follow the flying boi and see the enviroment, the pterosaur flies over a beach on which we see a Baryonyx walking. The theropod stops and looks at the pterosaur, then continues his journey.
Caulkicephalus, another pterosaur we encounter on our journey. Towards the end of the jurassic, a new group of pterosaurs appeared, they didn't have long tails anymore, a lot of them had crests on their heads and they were much larger than their rhamphorhynchid relatives, Caulkicephalus itself has a wingspan of 5 meters, they took over the skies while Rhamphorhynchids went extinct.
Caulkicephalus boi then swoops down and stops just a little bit above the sea water, and he dips his beak in the water and catches a fish.
Fish are one of their main sources of food, but they eat other things as well. Like carrion.
We see a plesiosaur that got washed ashore, his carcass is getting eaten by a bunch of Caulkicephalus bois.
This long necked creature is, or rather was a plesiosaur. They're among the fastest and most agile predators of the sea, but this one got washed up ashore during a storm.
The camera shows a carcass of a Caulkicephalus.
The marine reptile isn't the only victim of the storm. Mercilessly thrown around by the the powerfull winds, this Caulkicephalus also become another victim of the greatest killer of all time, mother nature.
A Caulkicephalus cannibalizes the carcass of his fallen comrade.
Only the strongest get to feast on the plesiosaur carcass.
A larger Caulkicephalus bites a smaller one and the smaller individual backs away, the larger individual roars at him to stay away. The smaller individual flies away and so do other Caulkicephaluses, the large individual turn around and sees a Baryonyx approaching, he flies away too. Also a thing that is probably worth nothing is that the plesiosaur carcass isn't big, it's like 4.5 meters long. Anyway, the titular dinosaur.
This 10 meters long predator has an oversized claw on its thumbs, which it was named after. It's the heavy claw himself, Baryonyx. It's the middle of their mating season and this male has quite the journey behind him. He's looking for a female, but right now he's hungry.
The male Baryonyx scavenges the plesiosaur carcass. He eats until he's full and leaves.
The next day the male Baryonyx manages to find a female.
So the female doesn't have the blue color on her face. And the male and female do the you know what. And then the male leaves.
Male Baryonyx's don't stay with the female after copulating. The females have to raise their children on their own.
Now we take a look at a commically large spoonful of Eucamerotus.
At a lenght of 15 meters, a height of 7 meters, and a weight of 20 tonnes, Eucamerotus isn't as big as the sauropods we saw in the jurassic period, and because of that they still have predators even when they reach full size. Their predator is this Neovenator.
Neo boi hides in da bushes and it takes a quick look at the herd of the sauropods. The camera then shows the whole creature.
Neovenator is a member of a family of predators that was named after it. They branched of from carcharodontosaurids.
Neo boi spots an Eucamerotus that walked away from the herd to take a drink. Man carnivores would be fukuiraptored if not that one idiot that doesn't stick to the heard.
(1:22)
Neovenator is 8 meters long, and weights 2 tonnes, even if Eucamerotus isn't big for a sauropod it's still much larger than Neovenator, so how is a Neovenator supposed to kill one? The answer is: it can't.
Neovenator runs towards Eucamerotus as fast as it can, Eucamerotus hears the footsteps of the predator and turns around, but before it can Neovenator bites the sauropod in the side and when what I'm pretty sure is everyone's favourite part of the theme is kicks in, we see blood get splashed on the ground and then the foot of Neovenator who quickly backs away, then the camera shows that Neovenator holds a pretty damn big chunk of flesh in its mouth, the camera then shows the Eucamerotus as it screams in pain for a while before furiously charging at Neovenator who is way faster and gets away. The sauropod stops cahsing the carnivore and returns to his herd.
Neovenator isn't big enough to take on these sauropods, but it is big enough to be a threat to them. It's razor sharp teeth cut through flesh like a knife through butter.
After he makes sure that the angered sauropod isn't chasing him anymore, Neovenator sits down and enjoys his meal.
2 months pass and a we see Caulkicephalus boi land near a river.
These reptiles may look graceful when their up in the skies, but they're rather clumsy when on land.
Caulkicephalus boi takes a drink from the river, but he's very cautious, but he doesn't realise that he's being watched.
A predator in the bushes is waiting for the perfect moment to strike.
The camera reveals that it's the soon to be mama Baryonyx.
Neovenators prefer to attack young iguanodons, Eotyrannus prefer chasing
Hypsilophodons around, while Baryonyxes will take anything they can clamp their jaws on. Something already dead? Of course. A fish or a baby Iguanodon? Why not? A Caulkicephalus that they can ambush? Why wouldn't they try?
The Baryonyx sneaks up on the pterosaur. But the pterosaur turns around and sees her, the Baryonyx runs towards the flying reptile, but the flying reptile takes off. Baryonyx tries to catch it and if only it was just a little closer she could have actually catch it, as her jaws closed a few centimeters away from the legs of the pterosaur.
With nothing better to do now, the female Baryonyx takes a sip.
So she starts drinking and after a while she stops.
But her nose caught the scent of an easy meal.
And she follows the scent. Then we see what that easy meal is.
The Eucamerotus that was attacked by a Neovenator 2 months ago.
The Eucamerotus is really weak and after a few steps it lays on the ground.
The wound that the Neovenator left behind didn't heal properly and the Eucamerotus caught an infection.
We take a look at the nasty looking infected wound.
Bacteria got to the injury and the flesh around the wound is rotting. The infection also spreaded through the bloodstream. These are her last moments.
The sauropod raises his head and with one final bellow slowly stops breathing.
Her herd leaves her behind, as they have no social bonds.
A Neovenator appears on the scene.
The hunter patiently waits until the sauropod stops breathing. His ancestors seen seemingly doomed sauropods gather enough strenght to get back up. Since then they learned that they can never be to carefull with these giants.
Soon to be mama Baryonyx shows up.
Baryonyxes however ralely deal with sauropods, and the female approaches the still breathing sauropod without a second thought.
The Baryonyx eats as the Neovenator waits.
Looking at how nothing happened as the Baryonyx started feasting on the sauropod, the Neovenator gathers enough courage and joins the feast as well. The Eucamerotus is pretty big and both the Baryonyx and Neovenator will be able to eat until they're full. But that doesn't mean that the Baryonyx will tolerate the presence of the smaller predator. That's why Neovenator uses the same tactic he used while hunting the sauropod, he tears a chunk of flesh out of the Eucamerotus and walks away to eat it, then repeats the process.
Both eventually get full and walk away.
This was a big meal. It will keep both predators full for 2 weeks. They can rest now.
Then we take a look at a Hypsilophodon, who walks out of a burrow.
This young male spent the a entire day working on his new home.
We take a peek inside.
It's big enough to fit him, a mate and a nest inside. The main porpose of the burrow is for shelter. Hypsilophodon often fall prey to Eotyrannuses. But that doesn't mean they're defenseless on land. They're really fast.
The lil guy goes into a river
He's taking a bath. The mating season for Hypsilophodons just begun, and to impress a lady the male has too look good. And after spending an entire day digging, he doesn't look that well.
He finishes the bath and squeks loudly until he gets a response from a female, and before a female answers it's night time.
First the female checks the burrow, to see if it's cozy and big enough to fit an entire family.
The female goes into the burrow and goes out after a while
The male passes the passes the first test. Now he has to impress the female with a mating dance.
So uhh, I'm to lazy to think of any mating dance, so the małe does mating dance and gets laid.
Now we look at 2 Returning dinosaurs, first one of them is the Iguanodon
Iguanodon is the 2nd largest herbivore in this ecosystem. They can grow up to 10 meters in lenght and weight 5 tonnes. More than twice the mass of a Baryonyx. They're extremely territorial towards predators. They may not look threatening, but they are. The spikes on their thumbs are deadly weapons.
They're also good parents.
We see coot baba Iguanodon with Mama Iguanodon. Then we see an Iguanodon eating from a bush thing.
The Iguanodon and its relatives are unique as they are the first herbivores to develop back teeth designed to chew its food. This was one of the key factors to the success of this group, as their descendants the hadrosaurs reigned until the very end of the cretaceus period.
Then there's Polacanthus, the second returning dinosaur
The herd has company. A Polacanthus. These armoured herbivores like hanging out near the larger Iguanodons. They evolved in the late jurassic and quickly took the place of Stegosaurids, who are still present in some parts of the world, but are going extinct cause of competition from Ankylosaurids. Lateron some Ankylosaurs would evolve clubs on their tails, at the cost of the sharp spikes, but the more spiky ones would still stay until the end of the dinosaur times.
The Polacanthus is vibin' when it gets approaches by an Eotyrannus.
Eotyrannus is a distant relative of the infamous Tyrannosaurus, but right now they're pretty far from being the kings of the dinosaurs. They only grow to 4 meters in lenght.
Eotyrannus carefully approaches Polacanthus, who doesn't give a poop.
Polanthus are rather ignorant.
Eotyrannus bites Polacanthus. Polacanthus gets out of its grasp and roars at it.
The carnivore realises that Polacanthus is no pushover. It retreats.
Polacanthus continues vibin'.
9 months later. Mama Baryonyx has built a nest and laid eggs.
Baryonyx are good mothers. The mothers and children have a very strong bond. They can communicate with eachother before the children hatch from their eggs, speaking of which there are 10.
And baba Baryonyx make baba croc noises AKA laser gun noises. The mama Baryonyx is forced to leave the nest cause hunger.
To make sure that her children survive, the mother has to stay alive, she's hungry and has to find food for herself. She remembers what part of the year is this. A nearby river should be filled with migrating fish at this point.
We see a school of generic fish things swimming through the river.
These fish travel a long way from the sea back to the place their birthplace.
Mama Baryonyx violently yeets one of them out of the water.
Many of them will die during this journey, but many of them will survive and reproduce, thus allowing their species to survive.
Mama Baryonyx finishes eating the fish she caught and she catches another one with her jaws. An Eotyrannus shows up and eats the rest of the fish mama Baryonyx left behind.
Eotyrannus ofter feed from the kills of larger predators. It's a lifestyle they enjoy.
Baryonyx eats a bunch of fish and Eotyrannus eats a nich of leftovers. Mama Baryonyx goes back to her nest. And encounters a generic mammal thing, that's trying to eat her eggs so mama Baryonyx says no to that.
The mother quickly checks the damage, 1 of her eggs has been eaten while she was gone. She repairs the nest and continues guarding it.
A year later cause yes.
2 baba Baryonyx stand near a river and mama Baryonyx shows up.
Only the 2 strongest hatchlings survive. It might feel a little bit sad, but it's good really good for the species as it allows the strongest genes to be passed on.
It's the same time of the year and the fishes are bacc.
The mother has to teach her children a lot of things, such as fishing.
Mama Baryonyx catches a fish and let's her children eat it.
The older child isn't really that hungry. It tries to catch a fish on its own.
Epik fail, it falls into the water while trying to. The water current drags it away, but mama Baryonyx catches it and saves it. Now we take a look at the Iguanodon herd again. A juvenille Iguanodon is taking a drink and we see a Neovenator hiding in a bush thing.
An adult Iguanodon could easily kill Neovenator, but a juvenille is easy prey.
The Neovenator prepares to attack, but then Mama Iguanodon finds her baba.
Mothers protecting their young are the most agressive. It's better to give.
But then Baba Iguanodon spots Neovenator.
The juvenille makes his mother aware of the predators position. And the Mother charges.
Neovenators side steps the charge. Mama Iguanodon stand on her hind legs and manages to stab Neovenator in the face.
All Neovenator can do now is run, and so he does.
Mama Iguanodon chases Neovenator, but Neo boi is faster and he gets away. Neo boi then goes to a river.
Perhaps there's easier food somewhere else.
Neovenator watches some fish swim.
This individual has seen Baryonyxes fish in the past, perhaps he can try?
Neo boi tries to catch a fish but he gets an epic fail.
He needs to be more patient.
Neovenator, this time more carefully, tries again. And he manages to catch a fish, but it slips out of his jaws, luckily it doesn't land in the water. Neovenator crushes the fish's head with his arm. He takes a sniff of the fish before swallowing it whole.
He doesn't enjoy the taste of the fish. He's going to stick to land animals.
He crosses the river, when we hear a thunder. Neovenator looks at the clouds and continues his search for food.
It's going to rain soon. But the animals are used to storms.
We go to mama Baryonyx.
The mother rests, it was a long day, it's going to get dark soon. But her children aren't tired yet. They're playing with eachother.
Baba's are fighting!
This will help them train their skills, they're going to be better fighters when they grow up.
They continue fighting when, a thunder goes brrr and it starts to rain.
(yes, I'm using music that isn't in WWD lol)
Storms this intense only happen once in thousand years.
EVERYTHING IS DYING
Caulkicephaluses that didn't hide in time are violently trashed around by the powerfull wind.
Poor Caulkicephalus gets slammed into a tree by the wind and dies.
The Iguanodons can't process what's going on, and they start mindlessly panicking.
Some Iguanodons get trampled by the other members of their.
Mama, Baryonyx shelters her children with her own body, when a lightning strikes a tree near them, setting it on fire. They run away, but her children can't keep with their mother and they get lost.
A small group of Eucamerotus got separated from their herd while panicking, they scream in horror.
The Hypsilophodon are safe in the burrow, for now.
A stream of water is slowly filling the burrow.
The mama Baryonyx realises that her children aren't anywhere near. She calls out for them, but she doesn't hear any reply. She starts looking for them.
Her motherly instinct can't let here forget about her offspring.
Mama Baryonyx is searching for her children in the forest, but she stumbles upon an Iguanodon that lost its herd while panicking. The Iguanodon aimlessly runs in circles, it lays down, then gets up again, slams into a tree while running, then lays down again and slowly calms down. Mama Baryonyx tries to walk around the herbivore, but the Iguanodon gets up roars at her.
Still scared, the Iguanodon enters combat mode as soon as he spots the Baryonyx. The female doesn't want to run away, she knows that her young are somewhere in the forest.
Mama Baryonyx roars at the Iguanodon. Iguanodon tries to hit her with the thumb spike, so mama Baryonyx dodges its attack and hits it with the heavy claw. Cha cha real smooth. Iguanodon grabs her upper jaw and with its second hand he stabs her in the side with the thumb spike, mama bary bites his hand. Mama Baryonyx bites Iguanodon in the neck, Iguanodon shakes her off and slams her into the ground. She gets up, but the slam into the floor broke her leg. Then a convieniently timed lightning strike spooks the herbivore. Mama Baryonyx is injured, but she continues her search.
By the morning the storm is over and we can see all the casualties.
The camera shows a bunch of dead and mangled Caulkicephaluses, Iguanodons that were trampled by their panicking herd and a baby baryonyx. Then the camera reveals that mama Baryonyx managed to find one of her children before it died.
There are also other survivors.
We see a Polacanthus monching on plants like if nothing happened.
Its brain couldn't process what was going on, so instead of panicking, the Polacanthus just sat in place confused.
Mama Baryonyx walks away with her only left child.
After a fight with the Iguanodon, the mother has a broken leg, which means she can't hunt, but that's not a problem right now. There's plenty of bodies around to eat.
A Neovenator finally found something to eat, an Iguanodon carcass. We then take a look on the Hypsilophodon family.
Theur previous borrow was flooded by the rain. And now the male Hypsilophodon is digging a new one.
The camera zooms out and we see a bunch of surviving Caulkicephaluses flying through the air.
And thus, life returns to its regular routine. In the next episode, we'll visit the scorching paradise.
An Uleghbegsaurus backs away after getting nearly chomped on by a Kansajsuchus.
