E25 - 25. A dinosaur covered in porcupine spines & the earliest fossil cloaca

The idea that dinosaurs were all scaley beasts got a massive challenge in 2000s when a variety of feather-like structures were found in fossils in China and other places. An even greater diversity of weird coverings have been found since then, most recently an iguanodontian covered in spines. This week we take a look at the porcupine looking Haolong dongi and what this means for dinosaur evolution. We also take a look some amazing trace fossils from the Permian of Germany, so detailed they even show the scales of an early reptile, including its cloaca. That's right, an improbable...