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Ichthyosaurus Vertebrae
Description: The Ichthyosaurus vertebrae are 3/4″ diameter X 1/2″ and 5/8″ long. The shale matrix is 2″ wide X 1 3/8″ high X 3/4″ thick. The image above is of a complete Ichthyosaurus fossil skeleton at the Houston Museum of Natural Science.
Location: Lyme Regis, Dorset coastline, England.
Interpretation: This Ichthyosaurus fossil is from the same location where 12-year-old Mary Anning (1799-1847) discovered the first complete ichthyosaur in England. Anning is a famous storybook character today because of her early fossil collecting in the Lyme Regis area, and because of her subsequent interactions with some of the most famous naturalists of her day.
When Mary Anning discovered her ichthyosaur fossil, the ideas of evolution and millions of years had not yet replaced the biblical explanation for origins within the circles of intelligentsia of England. However, by the time of the publication of Charles Lyell’s geology books in the 1830s, and the later publication of Origin of Species by Charles Darwin in 1859, most educated “scientists” had totally rejected the plain reading of God’s Word in Genesis chapters 1-11. The impetus behind this monumental change in thinking was the same then as it is today — the attempted rejection of the Creator God, a process succinctly explained by the apostle Paul in Romans chapter one of the Bible.
#MARF76
Ichthyosaurus Flipper
Description: The Ichthyosaurus cast replica fore flipper is 10″ long X 3 1/8″ wide X 5/8″ thick. The matrix is 6 7/8″ X 12 3/8″. There are over eighty individual bones (tile elements) in the flipper portion of the fossil. The number of long-axis digits is 5 1/2 and the longest digit has 19 tile elements.
Location: Somerset, United Kingdom.
Interpretation: One of the presuppositions of the evolutionary worldview is that homology proves evolution. That is, since different kinds of animals have similar morphology or design, then they must have a common ancestor from which they all evolved. Evolutionists teach that five-fingered hands (manus) all evolved from the “early tetrapods.” The proposed evolution of whales from land animals is largely predicated on the existence of five fingers in the whale forelimbs.
It is interesting to note that the marine animal currently being considered, the Ichthyosaurus, has paddles that at first glance look similar to those of whales. But the Ichthyosaurus did not have a “hand” with the familiar five fingers with separately-connected finger bones as do the whale, the manatee, the monkey, and man (see the image below). Instead it had tile-shaped bones arranged on the long axis as digits. In addition, the ichthyosaur digits are all squashed tightly together into a solid functional paddle-like appendage. Fossil ichthyosaurs have been found with from three to eight digits and up to thirty elements per digit.
The evolutionist believes that the ichthyosaurs “developed” this odd design for its flippers all on its own. The biblical creationist believes that God was the designer that provided this unique and functional way to allow the creature to navigate in the water. Nevertheless, since the ichthyosaurs are thought to be extinct today it is possible that there were inherent disadvantages to this flipper design which contributed to the demise of the ichthyosaurs during or after the Flood.
#OR27
Homology Illustration
Mosasaurs and their Teeth – 1
-2
-3
-4
-5
Description: In the series of five images immediately preceding this paragraph, are views of a number of teeth from the fierce extinct marine reptiles known as mosasaurs. The top picture is of a Mosasurus conodon skeletal reconstruction at the South Dakota Museum of Geology that shows a mouthful of large, sharp teeth.
Image two is a close-up look at the teeth in the mandible of Tylosaurus at the Morrison Natural History Museum in Colorado.
Image three shows actual fossil teeth from three species of mosasaurs, identified and described left to right as: Platecarpus ptychodon 1 1/8″ long X 1/2″ wide at the base and with noticeable grooves starting halfway up from the base; Tylosaurus sp 1 1/2″ long (4 1/2″ long counting the root) X 1 1/4″ wide without any noticeable grooves; Mosasaurus beaugei 1 1/2″ long X 3/4″ wide without any noticeable grooves.
Image four is of a fossil Mosasurus jaw fragment with three teeth in matrix. The mandible section is 2 7/8″ long X 7/8″ high X 3/8″ thick. The three teeth are all about 7/8″ long X 7/16″ wide at the base X 1/4″ thick at the base. The matrix measures 3″ wide X 2 3/8″ high X 3/4″ thick.
Image five is of fossil teeth from the mosasaur Globidens with tooth only on the left; and tooth with root on the right of the sign showing a complete mandible fossil. The tooth to the left is 1″ diameter X 7/8″ long. The rooted tooth is 1″ diameter (root is 1 1/4″ diameter maximum) X 3 1/8″ overall length.
Locations: Image 1 is from South Dakota, image 2 from Colorado, images 3-5 show actual fossil mosasaur teeth from Morocco.
Interpretation: As with most life kinds considered to be extinct, as are the mosasaurs, scientists have assigned numerous genera and species names to the fossils of these marine animals. There are at least a dozen mosasaur species, but some may be the same marine animal exhibiting variation within a created kind. Some mosasaur, pliosaur and plesiosaur teeth have longitudinal grooves on the exterior surfaces and some don’t, as seen in the images above. It is not possible for anyone to know for sure whether the existence of these tooth grooves is an indicator of a created kind differentiation. This issue is always a problem for both the biblical and evolutionary views.
Most mosasaurs are thought to have been very large marine animals up to 60 feet long. And they all had very large, sharp teeth as seen in in images 1-4 above. But, Globidens was a mosasaur that had teeth with an entirely different design. Rather than being pointed on the ends like other mosasaurs, Globidens teeth were similar to rounded nubbins on the ends. Secular scientists believe that Globidens developed this type of teeth to be better able to use clams and other sea animals with protective shells as food. They would propose that these teeth evolved from other tooth designs. However, no intermediate designs have yet been discovered in the rock record.
A biblical creationist explanation for the teeth of Globidens would be that, in the beginning, God created this kind of animal with rounded teeth for His own purposes.
#MARF21, 19, 22, 20, 30.
Pliosaurus Tooth
Description: The replica Pliosaurus tooth is 9 1/2″ long overall and the tooth itself has a mostly triangular cross-section. About one-third of the tooth surface starting at the pointed end has longitudinal grooves. This specimen has a root about 6″ long and the root cross-section is 2″ wide X 1″ thick.
Location: Unknown, probably Morocco.
Interpretation: Pliosaur and plesiosaur reconstructed fossil skeletons are similar in that they both have four paddles and a relatively short tail. However, pliosaurs had short, thick necks and plesiosaurs had very long slender necks. Pliosaurus was 33 to 40 feet long with large powerful jaws resembling those of a crocodile. Plesiosaurs had sharp teeth but not the powerful jaws or the large head of the pliosaurs. Usually if animals have large differences in teeth design, like seen here between pliosaurs and plesiosaurs, they would not be considered to be close relatives, but evolutionists believe these two genera have a common ancestor.
Because of the large tooth and front-end differences it is possible that these two animals really are different created kinds.
#OR19
Plesiosaur Teeth
Description: The plesiosaur tooth to the left is 3/8″ long X 1/8″ maximum diameter and has full-length longitudinal striations. It is not possible to know if this is a complete tooth or just the tip of a tooth. The tooth is jet black in color.
The plesiosaur tooth in the center is 2 1/8″ long X 1/2″ maximum diameter and has no striations. The tooth is dark brown in color.
The Nothosaurus tooth at the right is 1″ long X 1/4″ maximum diameter and has longitudinal striations for the full length of the tooth. It is missing about 1/4″ from the tip end. This tooth is jet black in color.
The image above the three teeth is a Plesiosaurus skeletal reconstruction showing a long neck and smaller teeth that differ from pliosaurs at the Houston Museum of Natural Science.
Locations: Nancy, France – phosphate beds of Morocco – Rothenburg, Bavaria.
Interpretation: Identified fossil plesiosaur teeth that are available from fossil dealers worldwide are either black or dark brown in color. Some have striations and some do not. There is not any noticeable difference in color and structure of the two black teeth in the above image, so why is one identified as a Plesiosaurus tooth and the other as a Nothosaurus tooth? This is because one was found in rock assumed to be millions of years older than the other. Therefore, according to evolutionary presuppositions, they cannot be the same animal and must be separated by millions of years of evolutionary change and extinction.
With the biblical presupposition of a one-year-long worldwide Flood having buried both teeth, it is possible to conclude that both black teeth came from the same created kind of marine animal.
#MARF6, 19, 23
Super Crocodiles
Description: The Sarcosuchus replica tooth is 1 3/4″ wide X 1 1/4″ thick X 6″ long. It has an oval cross-section except for the tip. The image above is of a super crocodile Deinosuchus skull.
Location:
Interpretation: The jaws of existing crocodiles have a variety of tooth sizes in the upper and lower jaws and it is difficult to determine where in the jaws a particular fossil tooth originated. The largest extant crocodile tooth the author has seen is about the size of his pinkie finger, so the Sarcosuchus tooth shown above is very impressive.
Today’s saltwater crocodiles can grow to be over twenty feet long and weigh a ton. Sarcosuchus super crocodiles have been reconstructed to be nearly forty feet long with an expected weight of many tons. Evolutionists agree that crocodiles are living fossils and are not much different from those found in the rock record. This means that the biblical creationist view that crocodiles were created only thousands of years ago make sense, and the various super crocodiles like Sarcosuchus and Deinosuchus from the rock record are likely the same created kind as are today’s saltwater crocodiles. The author believes that a super crocodile was the Leviathan that God describes in chapter 41 of the book of Job in the Bible.
#OR20
Sarcosuchus Armor Plate
Description: The replica scute (or osteoderm) is 5 1/2″ wide X 6 1/8″ long X 1 1/2″ thick. The exterior surface is shown in the image and the inside surface is relatively smooth. The exterior ridges are up to 5/8″ high.
Location: Sarcosuchus fossils have been found in a number of locations around the world including Niger, Africa and Brazil.
Interpretation: If Sarcosuchus was indeed Leviathan then its armor plate as seen above could certainly have been impenetrable by men as stated by God in chapter 41 of the book of Job.
#OR25
Crocodile Scutes
Description: The fossilized osteoderms range in size from 1 5/8″ X 1 3/8″ X 3/16″ thick to 7/8″ X 7/8″ X 3/16″ thick. Most of the osteoderms are slightly curved on the backside and the remainder are basically flat. The nine specimens to the right tend to have raised medial ridges while the remaining eleven do not have this characteristic.
Location: The Hell Creek formation in Carter County, Montana.
Interpretation: The Hell Creek formation covers portions of Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming. Intense studies over the past 150 years have found many fossil species of almost every kind of life imaginable in this rock formation. Many dinosaur fossils have been discovered there as well as the crocodilians represented by the osteoderms shown here.
Experts differ in their descriptions of the extent and design of the surface scutes and the underlying body osteoderms in the various living crocodilians. There is also little consensus regarding what type of osteoderm matches crocodiles versus alligators in the fossils. Some experts say fossil osteoderms with medial ridges are from alligators and those without are from crocodiles. However, the super crocodile Sarcosuchus had ridges on its armor plates.
One thing that is sure from the rock record is that crocodiles and alligators similar to those living today existed at the same time as the monster crocodiles, like Sarcosuchus, prior to the global Flood. We know that because we find their teeth, osteoderms and other hard parts in the rocks remaining from the catastrophe at the time of Noah.
#MARF75
Fossil Bird Gallinuloides
Description: The Gallinuloides bird skeleton is 4 1/8″ tall with a skull 1 1/2″ long.
Location: From the limestone of the Green River formation in Lincoln County, Wyoming.
Interpretation: While millions of fish are fossilized in the limestone layers of the Green River formation, birds are very rare. This is to be expected since they would have been able to fly above the worldwide Flood commotion below them and were less likely to be quickly buried. Many birds would have been able to exist for awhile by landing on mats of floating vegetable matter before eventually dying of starvation. Their remains would have rotted away in the same way as the remains of dead birds do today.
#OR10
Pterodactylus Skeletons
Description: P. kochi replica cast dimensions are 2 1/2″ skull length, 15/16″ femur length, 15/16″ humerus length, and matrix size of 6 3/8″ wide X 5 9/16″ high. P. antiquus replica cast dimensions are 3 1/8″ skull length, 1 1/8″ femur length, 1 1/8″ humerus length, matrix size of 6 7/8″ wide X 8 1/4″ high.
Location: The limestone layers of Solnhofen in Bavaria, Germany.
Interpretation: Numerous pterosaur specimens identified as genus Pterodactylus have been discovered, especially from Solnhofen sediments. Some evolutionists believe that only Pterodactylus antiquus is a valid name and P. kochi should be incorporated into the P. antiquus classification.
The two specimens above are very similar, but P. antiquus is slightly larger. This could be attributable to sex or age differences. Any minute differences in skeletal design could be due to variation within the kind that accumulated during the 1,600 years from the time of the fall to the time of the Genesis Flood.
#OR21, 23
Rhamphorhynchus Skeleton
Description: The replica cast Rhamphorhynchus dimensions are 2 7/16″ skull length, 9/16″ femur length, 3/4″ humerus length, 6 3/4″ tail length, and matrix size is 10″ wide X 13 3/4″ high. The image above the cast is of a museum reconstruction of pterosaur Rhamphorhynchus at the Wyoming Dinosaur Center.
Location: Solnhofen in Bavaria, Germany.
Interpretation: Pterosaur Rhamphorhynchus is extremely different in design from Pterodactylus as well as the well-known Pteranodon. These three pterosaurs are all different kinds of flying reptiles from the rock record that were created on day five, and then some 1,600 years later, rapidly buried in the Flood.
Many cryptozoologists believe that recent sightings around the world indicate that some kinds of pterosaurs still exist. If so, these would be additional examples of living fossils that would add to the huge body of evidences that discredit evolutionary hypotheses.
#OR24
Trionyx Turtle
Description: The turtle Trionyx shell is 4 3/8″ wide X 5 1/8″ long and has 3/8″ and 1/2″ diameter indentations 1 1/8″ apart that evolutionary scientists suggest are bite marks from an alligator or crocodile. The skull is 2 1/4″ long and the matrix is 9″ wide X 12 1/2″ high.
Location: Green River formation near Kemmerer, Wyoming.
Interpretation: The secular explanation for the millions of fish and other fossils (including this turtle) discovered in the limestone quarries of the Green River formation is a slow covering of 4 1/2 thousandths of an inch of sediment per year over a period of 4,000 years. The turtle fossil is flattened from the overburden, but is still about 1/4″ thick. so, according to the uniformitarian view, it would have taken at least sixty years to cover the turtle during the fossilization process. Common sense tells us that this is not a reasonable explanation and a catastrophic cause makes far more sense.
The author personally inspected the actual fossil Trionyx from which this cast was made. While it is possible that the indentations are from the teeth of a crocodillian, the entire rear portion of the shell is depressed, leading the author to be open to other causes for the indentations. These possibilities are nearly endless if it is understood that the fossilization process for this turtle was cataclysmic in origin.
Trionyx is a living fossil that is still abundant today in lakes, estuaries, and slow-moving rivers. And this specimen is also a polystrate fossil. Living fossils as well as polystrate fossils can be used to effectively argue against deep time and for support of the biblical timeline.
#OR18
Propelodytes Frog
Description: The replica fossil frog is 2 7/8″ wide X 5 3/8″ long and its skull is 1 1/8″ wide X 1 ” long. The matrix is 6 3/4″ wide X 8 1/8″ long. The matrix color shade is somewhat darker than the actual shale matrix.
Location: From the Messel Pit near Darmstadt, Germany.
Interpretation: This Propelodytes fossil frog has the slender streamlined body and the pointed head of frogs today. Its large feet are attached to powerful hind legs that provide the frog with the thrust needed for its amphibious environment. This fossil frog is dated at fifty million years old by evolutionists, yet looks the same as frogs of today. There are varieties of frogs and some extinct frogs, but they are all frogs with none of them seen evolving from, or to, some other life form.
Many other kinds of animals and plant fossils have been found in the Messel Pit. They are all complete and functional with no indication of morphological transition into something else. The Messel fossils are split from shale in a manner simialr to the way fossils are recovered from the Solnhofen limestone of Germany, the Green River limestone of Wyoming and other sites around the world.
#OR29
Eryops Amphibian
Description: The Riker display box is 4 3/8″ X 3 3/8″ and the fossil claw at the lower right is 3/8″ long. The adjacent fossil toe bone is 5/16″ long X 3/16″ diameter. Just above the two bones inside the Riker box is a picture of all four toes of the Eryops and in the image above is a museum reconstruction of a complete Eryops skeleton at the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Canada.
Location: Admiral formation near Waurica, Oklahoma.
Interpretation: Eryops was an amphibian with a skeletal design similar to frogs, toads and salamanders. However, fossils of Eryops have been found that indicate it could grow to be five feet long with a large triangular skull and short, powerful legs. Amphibians lay their eggs in water and cannot live long in areas without standing water.
Many mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds and dinosaurs have similar designs for their arms and feet. That is, these component parts are homologous. Evolutionists explain these similarities as the result of evolution from a common ancestor over millions of years. To the evolutionist homology is the conclusive proof of evolution. The biblical creationist view is that God used similar designs at the time of creation for similar functions in different animals kinds. While variation within kinds is allowed by the DNA in creatures, there is no macroevolution of one kind into another kind.
#OF11
Icaronycteris Bat
Description: The replica fossil bat skeleton is complete. The bat is 4 5/8″ long X 2 3/8″ wide and the matrix is 2 5/8″ X 5 1/4″.
Location: Green River formation near Kemmerer, Wyoming.
Interpretation: This particular fossil holotype for this kind of bat was discovered in the early 1930s and is among the “oldest” bat fossils discovered so far. With the genus name Icaronycteris it looks like it could be a “mouse-tailed” type of bat like those in existence today.
As with all mammals, evolutionists cannot concoct a family tree for bats from the beginning of their supposed evolution, and so have no idea what the bat’s common ancestor might be. The author believes that there are lots of genera of bats living today that are variations of the original kinds of bats that God created in the beginning.
What the rock record shows is bats with bat characteristics, and not animals developing bat characteristics from other animal kinds. Bats are bats and always have been bats. That sounds like a description of creation, not evolution!
#OR30
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