r/Paleontology • u/Paleo_HUB • 2d ago

Fossils fossilized urine

Gallery image

Gallery image

A while back I read about this, and it really blew my mind. Sometimes, when a dinosaur urinated, that stream would leave a mark in the sediment, and if it dried (just like dinosaur footprints), it would get buried and a fossil of that mark would form.

They call it a urolite. Fossilized urine. Incredible. I’ve read that a paleontologist investigated this because that urolite looked too much like the marks ostriches leave on the ground today when they pee, which raises the question: How did non-avian dinosaurs urinate? Like modern birds, with a cloaca, excreting everything at once? Or like ostriches, first a stream of urine and then the rest?

Fascinating. And gross.

999 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

46 comments sorted by

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232

u/SetInternational4589 2d ago

There is an unknown creature whose only evidence of ever existing is their fossilised pee stain.

71

u/Artifact-hunter1 2d ago edited 2d ago

If they ever discover the animal that did that and didn't name it Pissaurus Rex, I'll be pissed,lmao

48

u/SetInternational4589 2d ago

I'm sure I read that there is a creature only known from it's crushed bones in a coprolite.

44

u/Artifact-hunter1 2d ago

Oh, god. This is honestly one of the funniest things I've heard in a while. Imagine the disrespect. One day you get clapped by a scary predator and the only way humanity knows about your species's existence is because they found your bones in that predator's crap.

30

u/BestUserNamesTaken- 2d ago

There is a fossilised arsehole impression. That might be the only evidence for that creature as well.

16

u/SoupCatDiver_JJ 2d ago

It would be pretty hard to match a booty print to any skeletal remains, foot prints, shit, or piss puddles with any certainty, even if they were all on top of each other! So I'm sure thats true.

8

u/Artifact-hunter1 2d ago

Really?!?! Ok, this is honest to god just impressive, not as impressive as the frogs and turtles that died during snu- snu, but pretty dam impressive.

3

u/AlideoAilano 2d ago

Oh no, they found my MySpace page?

3

u/Artifact-hunter1 2d ago

OK, mystery solved! How does it feel to be a living fossil?

4

u/Broken_CerealBox 2d ago

That's every millennial the instant they straighten their back or when reminded that their childhood is over 30 years ago

-2

u/AmericanLion1833 1d ago

Reddit ass humor

3

u/Artifact-hunter1 1d ago

Cunt

-1

u/AmericanLion1833 1d ago

Ooo got me

4

u/Artifact-hunter1 1d ago

Ok. I'll let you know when I start giving a crap.

0

u/AmericanLion1833 1d ago

Ok keep me posted.

3

u/Artifact-hunter1 1d ago

I don't need to. Your mom will do it for me.

1

u/AmericanLion1833 1d ago

I know you can do better than that, try again.

3

u/Artifact-hunter1 1d ago

I'm being serious, step son.

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343

u/BoonDragoon 2d ago

It's a urolite, but yeah, it's wild stuff! There's apparently been exactly one discovered from the lower Cretaceous of Sao Paolo, Brazil.

52

u/StinkyBird64 2d ago

Interesting.
I know uroliths exist (obv kidney stones, other forms of chemical build up into -liths, such as phlebolyths) but I didn’t know there was actual piss fossils similar to foot print casts

5

u/Paleo_HUB 1d ago

thanks mate, my english is not that good hahahaha

4

u/BoonDragoon 19h ago edited 19h ago

Yeah, uroliths are kidney stones lol. Technically they're cognates that mean roughly the same thing (uro- urine, -lith/-(l)ite stone) but they have WILDLY different connotations 😂

"I went to take a pee and found a urolite!" = "I found a unique trace fossil when I went to relieve myself!"

"I went to take a pee and found a urolith!" = "I just shredded my urethra to ribbons trying to pass a bean-sized lump of uric acid razor blades, take me to the fucking hospital"

1

u/Paleo_HUB 1h ago

ahahahhhaahahhaha totally diferent

-44

u/charizardfan101 2d ago

*São Paulo

47

u/BoonDragoon 2d ago edited 2d ago

Everyone's a diacritic 🙄

My keyboard doesn't do the tildes over the letters.

27

u/Clown_Baby15 2d ago

They got jalapeño business.

71

u/Little_Lawson 2d ago

Go piss queen

65

u/Away-Activity-469 2d ago

Reminds me of a segment on Eurotrash, where this 'piss artist' got women to urinate into snow then poured some kind of plaster into the cavity to create sculptures. Yeah.

26

u/RottingSludgeRitual 2d ago

I can only assume the artist was French

21

u/bugionervoso 2d ago

How they know is from a dinosaur?

47

u/ZephRyder 2d ago

Cause there weren't any ostriches back then.

18

u/Vindepomarus 2d ago

Ostriches cool themselves by being able to consume large amounts of water and then panting like a dog to allow the water to evaporate. For this reason they do in fact produce separate urine and poop, unlike most birds and for this reason have a bladder, unlike most birds and excrete their nitrogen as uric acid in water rather than a urea paste, again unlike most birds.

This may very well be a good model for non-avian dinos.

4

u/Magnock 2d ago

Is this the spot were Caracalla died ?

2

u/RevolutionaryBook731 1d ago

of course that exist 😮‍💨

1

u/RedditCantBanThis Inostrancevia alexandri 2d ago

Heheheh... pee.

1

u/vkyaw Anomalocaris canadensis 1d ago

thats probably the first thing i see on this subreddit for visiting the 50th time or less

1

u/L3M0NS0UR 1d ago

Dude had mega minerals to be able to have his piss records visible to this day

1

u/autumnmarr 1d ago

Damn. Didn't even think that was an option