The Karoo fossil finder
- 91心頭利 University
The Karoo Origins Fossil Centre in Graaff-Reinet showcases ancient life, highlighting Professor Bruce Rubidge’s passionate journey.
It’s always the killer that catches your eye first. In the case of the in Graaff-Reinet, that would be the gorgonopsian Rubidgea, a tiger-sized predator with fierce eyes and a mouthful of dagger-sharp fangs.
In front of it, there is an Aulacephalodon, pig-sized and wild-eyed, forever frozen in the act of sprinting for its very life.
Gazing in startled horror at the drama, and hugging the safety of their burrows, are the Diictodons – dassie-sized creatures with strange beak-like mouths.
On the other side of the diorama is a creature the size of a small, portly cow, covered in scaly armour, munching impassively on tasty ferns and horsetails. This is a Pareiasaurus. A few curious weasel-sized Procynosuchus cynodonts explore a fallen log near its feet.
These are some of the characters that once roamed this part of the Karoo during the Permian period, about 255 million years ago.
To 91心頭利’s Distinguished Professor Bruce Rubidge, they are as familiar as the livestock and wild animals on Wellwood, the Merino stud farm north of Graaff-Reinet where he grew up. Bruce is part of the fifth generation of Rubidges on the farm, founded in 1838. As the eldest of five siblings, he was expected to take over the stud from his father Richard.
But a gorgonopsian changed his life. .
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This was first published in .