Tyrannosaurus rex had scaly skin and wasn’t covered in feathers, a new study says

New research says no feathers on the T-rex. According to Jurassic Park they were scaly and the new study confirms what Hollywood already knows.

Tyrannosaurus rex was an odd animal, a predator with teeth the size of bananas, a massive head and tiny arms. Given that many dinosaurs had feathers, could T. rex have been even weirder — a giant carnivore with a downy coat?

A new study in the journal Biology Letters crushes any tyrant chicken dreams: T. rex was covered in scales. The new research “shows without question that T. rex had scaly skin,” study author Phil R. Bell, a paleontologist at Australia's University of New England, said in an email to The Washington Post.

www.washingtonpost.com... dy-says/?utm_term=.fcc118d45bb6

Some of the T-rex's relatives that were substantially smaller had feathers but mainly to keep warm. Big dinos had a problem getting rid of heat so no feathers.

Nearly all of the outward appearance of dinosaurs is conjecture, a shoulder-shrugged guess, or worse yet, some *hole scientist writing his opinion down as fact.

It's as simple as this...

WE DONT KNOW AND DUE TO THE AGE OF SPECIMENS STUDIED, WE NEVER WILL.

It's just too hard for people to say we don't know something and quite possibly will never have the technology available to do so...

Well to be honest I never even knew they thought it had feathers! Shows how much I know. It was a land animal didn't fly so why would it have feathers?

a reply to: the owlbear

No, no, no this is a study. Wonder if the grant money had run out and time to release some info from the important study.

...and it had a silver leg

a reply to: PhyllidaDavenport

Some sort of crest, if the artist renditions are even remotely accurate. Along the top of its head and along its spine.

For some reason, I'd find a tyrant chicken much scarier than the common conception...I grew up around chickens and roosters can be psychotic. So a 30' tall psycho chicken, with saber like teeth is actually rather a frightening concept....

originally posted by: seagull
a reply to: PhyllidaDavenport

Some sort of crest, if the artist renditions are even remotely accurate. Along the top of its head and along its spine.

For some reason, I'd find a tyrant chicken much scarier than the common conception...I grew up around chickens and roosters can be psychotic. So a 30' tall psycho chicken, with saber like teeth is actually rather a frightening concept...

.

That's the thing...it will and shall always be concepts.
There is no possible way to know what dinosaurs looked like, how they acted, their mating habits, etc. EVER. Outside of a time machine.

Some paleontologists just want more attention to get more grant money to make even bigger conjectures and theories that can never really be proven or disproven.

a reply to: the owlbear

It's the nature of the game at that level of academia. Publish, or perish, is the rule. I don't suppose, other then in the abstract, it matters a great deal what you publish, so long as your peers can accept it.

That's the fun, I've discovered, of a realm of academia that is half informed conjecture, and half hopeful thinking.... Hopefully, I'll be able to finish my degree so I can join in.

Never knew it supposedly had feathers... That's a new one on me. It didn't have feathers in the world I've ALWAYS known. More Mandela Effect evidence I can check a box for I suppose. Lol.

It's strange, the article never actually says for sure they had no feathers, only that they may not have. The Post article header does not match the content of the research. Yes, it is possible that T-rex did not have feathers but I read research where they did find feathers around the old flesh areas on A t-rex dig, so who is right? I would rather believe the article written by the one doing the excavation on that dig, there were pictures that clearly showed featherlike structures at a set distance from the bone.

The pictures in the article of the OP actually more look like dried leather than scales. I'll wait on this to see more evidence with better proof before I believe this writer. Typical Washington Post article.

a reply to: SpeakerofTruth

It was more a strong hypothesis than actual stone cold evidence. I believe it was Chinese scientists who brought it forth originally, though I can't recall exactly...

It does make a great deal of sense that they might...as birds are about as close as it gets to dinosaurs these days, and they share a common ancestral path, or at least near kin.

But it's never, so far as I know, anything remotely resembling confirmed that anything so large as T-rex had feathers, or perhaps feather-like appendages...just to further cloud the issue .

a reply to: seasonal

How many millions of years did this species exist?
And only one specific breed existed?
Reason would have it that many versions of this species existed over that vast timeline..

All only with scales?
Okay if you say so scientists.

LIES!!!!

originally posted by: PhyllidaDavenport
Well to be honest I never even knew they thought it had feathers! Shows how much I know. It was a land animal didn't fly so why would it have feathers?

Evolution demands that dinosaurs has feathers to justify dinosaurs evolving into birds and flying away

There is plenty of speculative evidence dinos didnt have feathers, just doesnt help evolution theory or scientists receiving grants.

originally posted by: Raggedyman

originally posted by: PhyllidaDavenport
Well to be honest I never even knew they thought it had feathers! Shows how much I know. It was a land animal didn't fly so why would it have feathers?

Evolution demands that dinosaurs has feathers to justify dinosaurs evolving into birds and flying away

Your willful ignorance of evolution never ceases to amaze.

There is plenty of speculative evidence dinos didnt have feathers, just doesnt help evolution theory or scientists receiving grants.

There's also plenty of concrete evidence that many species did have feathers (or feather like structures).

a reply to: prevenge

Y'know they can only go on what they observe, and the thoughts that go along with 'em.

When only 50 or so fossilized skeletons exist to be studied, you can only go where your evidence takes you. Of those skeletons, none are complete. Sue is something like 80 percent or there'bouts, the rest far less.

It seems very likely that there were differences between individual strains of T-rex, and between individual T-rex's. I doubt we'll ever really know for sure.

I, for one, can do without the image a feathered T-rex brings to mind...psycho chicken with big, big teeth.

originally posted by: AdmireTheDistance

originally posted by: Raggedyman

originally posted by: PhyllidaDavenport
Well to be honest I never even knew they thought it had feathers! Shows how much I know. It was a land animal didn't fly so why would it have feathers?

Evolution demands that dinosaurs has feathers to justify dinosaurs evolving into birds and flying away

Your willful ignorance of evolution never ceases to amaze.

There is plenty of speculative evidence dinos didnt have feathers, just doesnt help evolution theory or scientists receiving grants.

There's also plenty of concrete evidence that many species did have feathers (or feather like structures).

So I am going to guess that YOU ARE NOT GOING to show me evidence that T Rex had feathers

a reply to: Raggedyman

What really happened;

originally posted by: the owlbear
Nearly all of the outward appearance of dinosaurs is conjecture, a shoulder-shrugged guess, or worse yet, some *hole scientist writing his opinion down as fact.

It's as simple as this...

WE DONT KNOW AND DUE TO THE AGE OF SPECIMENS STUDIED, WE NEVER WILL.

It's just too hard for people to say we don't know something and quite possibly will never have the technology available to do so...

According to the article linked in the OP, numerous samples of fossilized T Rex skin have been found, hard and scaly, no feathers.
Feathers have been found on T Rex precursors, but never a feather on a T Rex.

a reply to: the owlbear

They had fleshy faces, not all skeletal like scientific renditions, a freaking snake skin draped over a skull, lol wtf. They had faces. Not skin covered skulls, thats for sure. They talked and carried weapons. Thats just my science though, a lot funner than their play time.