How could 476 whale skeletons accumulate at the bottom of 6km ocean trench over 5 million years? Introducing the WHALE NECROPOLIS

Why did T.rex have such tiny weedy arms? 🦖 🔍💪 It has always been a mystery perplexing palaeontologists and non-palaeontologists alike. This week we find out what happened!

The mossy forests of the Devonian were towered over by mysterious 8m tall giants, Prototaxites. But what were these weirdos? New research suggests it not a plant, not a fungus, not an animal, but some other previously unknown form of life

A sneak peak of us sniggering about mammoths sneezing themselves to death 🦣🤧☠️

When did mammoths go extinct? Did they sneeze themselves to death as a result of allergies? We take a look at some 'massive' fossil fails in the latest episode: Weird ideas about how and when mammoths were "snuffed out"

How do you become a palaeontologist? @tweetisaurus.bsky.social and @fossilrob.bsky.social chat about their own routes and their advice for aspiring fossil fans

Jaw dropping fossil integument news: this new Iguanodontian was rather improbably covered in porcupine-like spines and this Permian trace fossil captures the earliest known cloaca

Around the same time and place, a new Burgess Shale type bonaza was discovered with a host of lovely and weird Cambrian critters

It has always been difficult to properly understand the Cambrian explosion because the fossil preservation windows are limited and change at the beginning of Cambrian. But take a look at this!

Was the solution to palaeo mysteries hidden right in front of our faces? High powered X-ray analyses of Silurian 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 fossils reveals cryptic 👁️ & 🦴 of early vertebrates, whilst new discoveries in Cretaceous 🇭🇺 find the missing European ceratopsians. Find out more in this week's new episode!

What do you want to hear about? Every week we cover a new palaeo paper or discovery. This time, we are asking you to choose! Take a look at the options below and 'like' the title(s) you want @tweetisaurus.bsky.social and @fossilrob.bsky.social to do next!

The end Permian nearly wiped out all life on earth.🌋🦈🐬🐍🐊🐸 Now new data shows that life bounced back much faster than expected with a big diversity of predators right at the beginning of the Triassic. Find out more in today's new episode

Is it our ability to survive lead poisoning that made us human?☠️ 🦧 🧠 🦷 A new study combining data from gigant orangutan fossil teeth and artificially grown brains in jars paints a picture of distant human origins and language development. Episode out today!

Gigantopithecus was a massive fossil orangutan with a weird origin story. Sneak preview of next week's episode for #FossilFriday

Thanks everybody for the support over the last year! 🥳 🎉 Here are the top 8 episodes for 2025- did your favourite make the list? Details of the episode and the artists of the images are on our YouTube channel and Libsyn pages

🚨 New episode out today: "Back breaking and baby making, the disturbing bedroom habits of hadrosaurs", 🦕❤️🦕we take a lurid look at pathologies and behaviours of duck bill fossils. Out now on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts

How did dinosaurs do it? We plumb new depths for the next episode 🦕❤️🦕

Thanks everyone support over the last year! Here is a look back at top episodes of 2025 🥳🎉

The fossil files is at #SVP2025 to bring you all the hot gossip. First episode “Nanotyrannus and vertebrate origins” is out today with @jgn-paleo.bsky.social, @stevebrusatte.bsky.social and Yara Haridy

The fossil files are at #SVP2025 and will be bringing you all the exciting developments and hot gossip. Episodes out this week

How did pachycephalosaurs get their head-butting dome? In the new episode out today, we take a look at Zavacephale, a lovely new dinosaur from the Early Cretaceous of Mongolia

Not only can a nasty fungus take over an ant or spider's brain causing behaviour changes before it explodes as spores out of the animal's head 🐜 🍄, but it seems this nightmarish behaviour can be captured in the fossil record. New episode: "Cretaceous Zombie Ants" new episode out today!

🦠 In a totally not petrifying story, a team in USA 'resurrected' and grew some 40k year old bacteria encased in Alaskan permafrost. Hey, its gonna melt soon anyway, best find out what will happen doi.org/10.1029/2025...

🪱 First body fossil of a leech discovered in Silurian of Wisconsin indicates hirudinidan origins about 200 million years (?!) before previous estimates peerj.com/articles/199...

🧽 A new source of evidence of Pre-Cambrian animals comes from molecular fossils. Steranes in Neoproterozoic rocks were likely produced by desmosponges, before the Cambrian explosion doi.org/10.1073/pnas...

🦎 A fossil squamate from the Jurassic of Scotland has a mix of snake and lizard like features which makes snake evolution even more complicated. Say hello to Breugnathair. doi.org/10.1038/s415...

💀 A Chinese team painfully reconstructed the smushed Yuxian 2 cranium and placed in the Homo longi clade (with Denisovans?) thus lots of ghost ranges and new time scale of human evolution www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

You can find the full episode on Spotfy, Apple, YouTube, or where ever you get your podcasts (links in bio)

Our newest episode is one not to miss! Susie spills the beans on the latest research on Spicomellus, a beautiful armored ankylosaur If you ever wondered what goes in to studying dinosaurs it’s the perfect way to answer your questions! Find us on Spotify, Amazon, YouTube etc. links in the bio

🚨 Bonus mini-episode released today! Where do Squid come from? Susie and Rob discuss squid origins and the use of digital techniques a new paper from Imegami et al Available on Spotify, YouTube and all the usual places. Links in our bio