Eromanga Natural History Museum

Dinosaurs (used to) rule. This was an interesting glimpse into the era of dinosaurs with some reveals as to why we believe some of the clues as to the formation of the world we know. Oddly Australia has been pivotal in piecing together our picture of the history of the earth.

The 20 minute introductory movie brings Cooper, the largest dinosaur found in Australia, to life and covers the billions of years since that first "big bang".

This new centre brings together literally thousands of hours of work following up the chance discovery of a baseball sized bone fragment by a fourteen year old lad around 2004.

The huge display bones were printed! The largest 3D printer in Australia uses recycled plastic to make a lifelike replicas of the bones based on the pieces that have been recovered. It takes weeks of printing to make each bone.

About 10% of a dinosaur sketeton is generally needed to identify its species but in the case of Cooper, our local hero, over 13% has been recovered. Even so it has taken 17 years to confirm earlier this year that Cooper is indeed the largest Australian dinosaur and belongs to a previously unknown species.

Elsewhere I read that fossilised skin provided great clues about the skin and texture of dinosaurs. I am guessing some artistic licence taken with the exact colouration.Read more