Dino Babies! by Robert T. Bakker

Dino Babies! Reviews

• 
  Herman Diaz

  Baby dinos for younger kids (
  www.amazon.com/review/RGGG87Q9W2PHE/r... ): 5/5
  
  Short version: As far as I know, there aren't any popular adult books about baby dinos (book chapters, yes, but not whole books). Therefore, Bakker's "Dino Babies!" (henceforth DB) is 1) the best baby dino book for younger kids, & 2) 1 of the best popular baby dino books period.
  
  Long version: Read on.
  
  Many popular baby dino books are OK, but not great. There are 3 main reasons for why I think that is: 1) They're mixed bags in terms of paleoart (Quoting Miller: "I bought the book expecting a more technical discussion of the animals discussed therein[...]but was surprised to find beautiful paintings of questionably-restored dinosaurs"); 2) They're confusing messes in terms of organization; 3) They fail to cover many baby dino-related subjects & those that are covered are done so in an insufficient manner (I.e. Sometimes, they simplify things to the point of being meaningless; Other times, they're just plain wrong). In this review, I list the 3 main reasons why I think DB succeeds where said books fail.
  
  1) As expected for a Bakker book, DB is very well-illustrated: Rey's digital paleoart, while overall not as good as his traditional paleoart, is still some of the best paleoart around;* In fact, in some ways, it's even better; Rey's "Ancestor dreaming" on page 23 is an especially good example of how symbolic & surreal his digital paleoart can be (
  https://web.archive.org/web/201511270... ).
  
  2) As expected for a Bakker book, DB is very well-organized: Pages 1-23 begin with a question ("Were dinosaurs good parents?"), continue with descriptions of 1) the ways in which living animals care for their young, & 2) the ways in which dinos did so, & end with a reminder ("Modern-day birds are descendants of raptors. When you watch a mom or dad eagle feeding its babies, you are seeing a living Deinonychus!"); Said descriptions are arranged in roughly chronological order (I.e. 1st Jurassic dinos, then Cretaceous dinos).
  
  3) As expected for a Bakker book, DB is very complete & concise: For 1 (in reference to "complete"), using Holtz's "Dinosaurs" as a guide, DB features representatives of 9 different dino groups; Compare that to the 6 different dino groups of Judge's "Born to Be Giants: How Baby Dinosaurs Grew to Rule the World"; For another (in reference to "concise"), see the Bakker quote; DB does in 2 pages what takes Judge's book 4 pages to do. Pages 21-22 are an especially good example of the former because of the brooding Deinonychus specimen (I.e. AMNH 3015, which is often not mentioned in popular dino books; Google "A possible egg of the dromaeosaur Deinonychus antirrhopus" for more info). My only gripes are the lack of early dinos & a few weird bits in the paleoart (E.g. The 3 T. rex on pages 17-18 all look like clones of 1 individual).
  
  *Don't take my word for it, though. Google "Congratulations to Luis Rey" & see for yourself.
  
  Quoting Bakker: "Today, ostrich dads are great babysitters. They'll guard up to forty chicks at once.
  Psittacosaurus[...]was a dinosaur babysitter. The adult was the size of a big chicken. Three dozen baby Psittacosaurus were found in Mongolia, all crowded around just one adult. Maybe it was Mom. Maybe it was Dad. Either way, he or she had a tough job!
  Psittacosaurus ate leaves, roots, and bugs. And lots of plants and bugs are poisonous. The babies probably watched what Mom or Dad ate. That way, they learned what to eat and what to avoid."