Dearcmhara shawcrossi: Shawcross's Marine Lizard of Skye, Scotland

Bearreraig Bay includes the northern beach from which Dearcmhara shawcrossi hails. Hunterian staff at Scotland’s oldest museum in Glasgow, Scotland’s largest city, judge themselves honored providers of Shawcross’s marine lizard’s home away from home for almost six decades now. They know that long-standing museum prestige will solidify with the increased funding, research, and visits subsequent to University of Edinburgh paleontologist Stephen Brusatte’s taxonomy of January 11, 2015 as lead researcher in PalAlba’s Scotland fossil-focused consortium of:

• Hunterian Museum;
• National Museum of Scotland;
• Scottish National Heritage in Inverness;
• Staffin Museum of Skye’s Trotternish peninsula; and
• Universities of Edinburgh and Glasgow.

They therefore like the cultural deference in their fossil receiving one of the world’s rare Gaelic genus names. 

The motorboat-sized reptilian fossil makes waves through:

• assumed predator-prey interactions with fishes and reptiles;
• hypothesized niche dominance in shallow, warm coastal seas;
• reconstructed snout-to-tail size at 14 feet (4.26 meters) from humerus, skull, teeth, vertebral fragments;
• suspected crocodile-, dolphin-, shark-like looks; and
• theorized primitive prediction of big-eyed, four-finned, large-sized ichthyosaurs 20,000,000 years later.

The sole specimen especially needs to be investigated for the significance of:

• a big triangular muscle attachment scar; and
• the deep ligament pit on the upper arm bone from the surviving quartet of flipper humerus and vertebral back and tail.

The two features operate to preserve what is ecologically, paleontologically, and taxonomically significant and unique regarding Dearcmhara shawcrossi as Jurassic water-world’s super-fast, super-strong swimmer. 

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Isle of Skye's Bearreraig Waterfall of Bearreraig River that flows from Loch Leathan to Bearreraig Bay
Isle of Skye, mostly under water during the Jurassic period (201.3± 0.6 million years ago [Ma] to 145± 4 Ma), stands out as one of world's best sites of Middle Jurassic fossils.
Isle of Skye, northern Inner Hebrides, western coast of Scotland: John Allan, CC BY SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bearreraig_Waterfall_-_geograph.org.uk_-_947475.jpg; John Allan, CC BY SA 2.0, via Geograph Britan and Ireland @ https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/947475

In 1959 fossil hunter Brian Shawcross gifted a humerus and three vertebrae, retrieved from Toarcian–Bajocian-aged (168.3–190.8 mya) deposits, to Scotland's oldest museum, Hunterian Museum, sited on main campus of University of Glasgow.
"Hunterian Museum"; ca. 1840 engraving by Edward Radclyffe (ca. 1809 - November 1863) from original study by Thomas Hosmer Shepherd (January 16, 1793–July 4, 1864)
"Hunterian Museum: Royal College of Surgeons," London Interiors: A Grand National Exhibition (1841), vol. I: 129-132; opp. p. 129: Wellcome Collection Gallery, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Royal_College_of_Surgeons,_Lincoln's_Inn_Fields,_London;_Wellcome_V0013494.jpg; Public Domain Mark, via Wellcome Collection @ https://wellcomecollection.org/works/d23jqtzu?wellcomeImagesUrl=/indexplus/image/V0013494.html; No known restrictions on publication, via Library of Congress Photo, Print, Drawing @ https://www.loc.gov/resource/cph.3c07136/

artist's interpretation of Dearcmhara shawcrossi
"Introducing Dearcmhara shawcrossi, the dino-fish that all the fuss is about" by Todd Marshall
S. Brusatte, "How we found Scotland’s first Jurassic sea reptile (and no, she’s not related to Nessie)," The Conversation, January 12, 2015: Todd Marshall, CC BY ND 4.0, via The Conversation @ https://theconversation.com/how-we-found-scotlands-first-jurassic-sea-reptile-and-no-shes-not-related-to-nessie-36165

"It's Not Nessie, But Jurassic Predator Found In Scotland" (1:22)
Uploaded January 12, 2015, by Newsy Science to YouTube ~ URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6N2POE0FBc

Dearcmhara shawcrossi belonged to an order of marine reptiles that became extinct for unknown reasons in Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) and that were replaced as top aquatic predators by plesiosaurs.
A school of ichthyosaurs; artist's interpretation by Paleo-artist Dmitry Bogdanov of Chelyabinsk, Russia
Dmitry Bogdanov, CC BY 3.0, via Sci-News @ http://www.sci-news.com/paleontology/science-dearcmhara-shawcrossi-ichthyosaur-scotland-02399.html

Palaeontologist's caricatural humor: "Awful Changes: Man found only in a fossil state -- Reappearance of Ichthyosauri"; 1830 lithograph by English palaeontologist Sir Henry de la Bèche (February 10, 1796 – April 13, 1855)
R.J. Chorley (1964) and M.J.S. Rudwick (1975) equate Professor Ichthyosaurus, respectively, with English geologist William Buckland (March 12, 1784-Aug. 14, 1856) and Scottish uniformitarian geologist Sir Charles Lyell (Nov. 14, 1797-Feb. 22, 1875).
Human skull's "very insignificant" teeth and "trifling" jaws puzzle Professor Ichthyosaurus as to the creature's food procurement.: Wellcome Collection, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ichthyosaurs_attending_a_lecture_on_fossilised_human_remains_Wellcome_V0001518.jpg

Benson, Thor. 11 January 2015. “Fossils of Large Ocean Reptile Discovered on the Coast of Scotland.” UPI > Science News. Retrieved July 20, 2015.

• Available @ http://www.upi.com/Science_News/2015/01/11/Fossils-of-large-ocean-reptile-discovered-on-the-coast-of-Scotland/2871421023575/

Bressan, David. 14 October 2010. "Geology History in Caricatures: Exploring and Educating Geohistory." History of Geology.

• Available at: http://historyofgeology.fieldofscience.com/2010/10/geology-history-in-caricatures.html

Brusatte, Stephen. 12 January 2015. “How We Found Scotland’s First Jurassic Sea Reptile (And No, She’s Not Related to Nessie).” The Conversation > Science + Technology. Retrieved July 20, 2015.

• Available @ https://theconversation.com/how-we-found-scotlands-first-jurassic-sea-reptile-and-no-shes-not-related-to-nessie-36165

Brusatte, Steve. 18 January 2015. “Huge Honour to Meet Brian Shawcross Today. The Man Who Found Dearcmhara and Donated it to the Hunterian Museum.” Twitter. Retrieved July 20, 2015.

• Available @ https://twitter.com/stevebrusatte/status/556791039760273408

Brusatte, Stephen L.; Young, Mark T.; Challands, Thomas J.; Clark, Neil D.L.; Fischer, Valentin; Fraser, Nicholas C.; Liston, Jeff J.; MacFadyen, Colin C.J.; Ross, Dugald A.; Walsh, Stig; and Wilkinson, Mark. 2015. “Ichthyosaurs from the Jurassic of Skye, Scotland.” Scottish Journal of Geology.

• Available @ doi: 10.1144/sjg2014-018

Buckland, Francis T. Curiosities of Natural History. First Series. London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd; New York: The Macmillan Company, 1903.

• Available at: https://wellcomecollection.org/works/tf8hz95u/

Connor, Steve. 12 January 2015. “First Remains of New ‘Shark-like Reptile’ Found on the Isle of Skye.” The Independent > News > Science. Retrieved July 20, 2015.

• Available @ http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/first-remains-of-new-sharklike-reptile-found-on-the-isle-of-skye-9971244.html

Dunham, Will. 11 January 2015. “Move Over Nessie, Scotland Gets a New Prehistoric Marine Reptile.” Thomson Reuters > Science. Retrieved July 20, 2015. 

• Available @ http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/01/12/us-science-reptile-idUSKBN0KL00520150112

Hilton, Lucy; and von Radowitz, John. 12 January 2015. “Loch Ness Monster’s Long Lost Relative Discovered in Scotland and It Grew up to 14ft Long.” Mirror > News > UK News. Retrieved July 20, 2015.

• Available @ http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/loch-ness-monsters-long-lost-4958101

Knapton, Sarah. 12 January 2015. “Was This Nessie’s Ancestor? Giant Prehistoric Monster Roamed Scottish Waters.” The Telegraph > News > Science > Science News. Retrieved July 20, 2015.

• Available @ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/11338263/Was-this-Nessies-ancestor-Giant-prehistoric-monster-roamed-Scottish-waters.html

Sample, Ian. 11 January 2015. Amended 16 January 2015. “Fossil from Skye Is New species of Marine Predator, Scientists Say.” The Guardian > UK News. Retrieved July 20, 2015.

• Available @ http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jan/12/fossil-skye-new-species-marine-predator

Sugden, Maureen. 11 January 2015. “Found, Nessie’s Long-lost Cousin: Dolphin-like Reptile Lived 170million Years ago in Seas Around What Is Now the Isle of Skye.” Daily Mail > News. Retrieved July 20, 2015.

• Available @ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2905908/Found-Nessie-s-long-lost-cousin-Dolphin-like-reptile-lived-170million-years-ago-seas-Isle-Skye.html 

Watts, Jack. 12 January 2015. Updated 30 January 2015. “Long Lost Relative of Loch Ness Monster Discovered off the Isle of Skye.” Express > News > UK. Retrieved July 20, 2015.

• Available @ http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/551424/Scientists-discover-relative-Loch-Ness-Monster-Isle-Skye