Spinosaurus Aegyptiacus
Earth's Most Magnificent Beast
A sketch drawn by myself depicting another one of my takes on the spinosaur design.
Spinosaurus Aegyptiacus
K.L. Orion
North Africa.
Approximately ninety-five million years ago.
Here lives a titan.
Spinosaurus Aegyptiacus. A nearly sixty foot long spinosaurus rooster stands idly in a shallow river, his decorated red and gray sail towering above the otherwise empty horizon line. The giant’s long face has its snout dipped in the water. His muzzle is covered in specialized sensors that allow him to detect movement in the water. This has provided him and his kind an effective and deadly hunting strategy. Rooster, this particular bull spinosaurus, waits patiently, scanning the water with his eyes and focusing on his sensors. His nostrils sit farther up his elongated head in order to breathe while the tip of his snout is beneath the surface. His face is like a cross between a heron’s and a crocodile’s, filled to the brim with cone-like fangs. His legs aren’t much longer than his arms, but they are still powerful, sitting atop webbed feet that allow him to stand on sand or aid him in a little bit of swimming. His arms are extremely powerful as well, tipped with long claws. Paired with his extravagant sail is an equally decorated tadpole-like tail covered in red and gray markings. However, this tail isn’t used much for swimming as it is utilized more for display. The final display feature sits atop his head; that being a little crest that is also covered in red and gray markings.
All of these adaptations allow Rooster to be an effective hunter of unique prey. Spinosaurs like himself don’t regularly hunt land-based prey like other predatory dinosaurs. Instead, most of this behemoth’s time is spent hunting fish. He is not a picky eater; his diet isn’t restricted to only fish. However, he is still best adapted for catching and dining on fish, so naturally that makes up most of his diet. And since it takes up most of his diet, obtaining fish takes up most of his time. Hunting is very time consuming. It requires great patience. Luckily for Rooster here, he has both the skills and patience for catching fish. So he waits, standing knee-deep in the river. The river is usually far deeper, but his home has been hit by a recent drought. This caused the river to become far shallower, driving out much of the local fish; especially the big ones. Rooster was growing hungry, but he wasn’t going to let that distract him. If his hunger was to be satisfied, he needed to focus. Focus and wait…
Something stirs below him.
Something big.
He feels it first in his sensors, and then he even sees something move just below the shallow water’s surface. But something’s wrong. Before he springs his attack, he realizes something’s not right with this “fish”. It’s big; far bigger than any of the fish he regularly snacks on. Suddenly, the experienced hunter knows what it is. The gigantic spinosaur rears up to keep its top half away from the water as an enormous crocodile-like monster springs from the water. The enemy’s huge, gnarly mouth flips wide open towards the spinosaurus, intending to drag down the giant dinosaur. However, the spinosaurus has the size advantage on this croc-like adversary in height, length, and weight. The semi-aquatic reptile’s mouth slams shut just short of the spinosaur’s belly, promptly slamming back down into the water when it does. Then, Rooster springs his own attack, throwing his clawed arms down on the crocodile’s neck to hold it still. He then bites down on the back of his opponent’s head, thrashing around as he does. The stockier enemy squirms and writhes about, trying to break free. Finally, Rooster eases his grip as the crocodile darts away to some other neck of the river far away from this massive spinosaurus.
This creature wasn’t a true crocodile or alligator, but it was a far larger relative of the modern crocodilians that lived in this Northern African ecosystem. Not only was it far larger, but it regularly ate dinosaurs. It would wait beneath the water’s surface to launch attacks on unsuspecting dinosaurs, no matter how big or powerful they were. Rooster, for example, is nearly twice the length of his attacker, but that didn’t stop the beast from trying. This isn’t the only carnivorous adversary Rooster coexists with in this area. Numerous other giant meat-eaters call this place home, earning this ecosystem the nickname “The Most Dangerous Habitat to Ever Exist”. In few other ecosystems to have ever existed has there been so many giant carnivores gathered in one place.
Luckily for Rooster, his generalist behavior and preferred fish-eating niche rarely puts him in competition with the other carnivores of the area, especially one of the biggest of them all. Carcharodontosaurus. The cousin of the infamous giganotosaurus. Carcharodontosaurus is around the same size and acted very similar to its famous cousin from South America. It’s been an enemy of the spinosaurs for ages. Rooster himself bears scars from battles with them, cementing his own fearful understanding of their power. He tries to avoid them the best he can, though sometimes they come looking for a fight. Fortunately, he hasn’t seen one for a very long time. While giant crocodiles might be proving a difficult challenge, he doesn’t have to worry much about the carcharodontosaurs anymore.
The remains of a spinosaurus tooth.
The battle with the giant crocodile relative has only made him hungrier. The river’s too shallow to sustain anything that would provide a good meal. Rooster thinks for a moment, then turns his massive body away towards a muddy floodplain left behind by the quickly receding river. His webbed feet smack down into the mud as he hoists himself onto the vast floodplain. It’s huge, stretching for hundreds of feet in front of him. Now, he puts his strong arms to use. He leans over and begins digging through the mud. As he scrapes up the surface of the moist ground, numerous lungfish ranging in all sizes spring out of the earth. Finally, the benefits of being a generalist. With his enormous jaws, he begins slurping up the lungfish he’s disturbed. Once he’s eaten all of the fish in one location, he moves on to another small plot of muddy land on the floodplain. He scrapes away the surface of the ground, releasing more and more lungfish. Though most of the lungfish aren’t very big, there’s hundreds of them in only an acre of land. This floodplain is a few acres wide, meaning there’s got to be thousands more. At long last, a feast for this weary hunter.
After dining on frightened lungfish for a little while, Rooster hears a nervous growl not far ahead of him. The titan lifts his head and is shocked when he sees another spinosaur standing about a hundred and fifty feet in front of him. It’s a spinosaurus, but it isn’t of the same species. It belongs to a smaller species closely related to spinosaurus aegyptiacus; this species being spinosaurus maroccanus. It looks almost identical to the aegyptiacus species, but it’s smaller and has yellow and brown colorations instead of red and gray. This particular maroccanus is a female who nervously cowers in the presence of the larger aegypticus bull. What’s more? She has a brood of hatchling spinosaurs standing behind her.
It isn’t unusual for spinosaurs to get into territorial conflicts, especially when food is scarce. It also isn’t unusual for bull spinosaurs to attack and eat baby spinosaurs. This scared mother isn’t in a good position. Rooster, being far bigger and older, could likely overtake her, though not without a difficult fight. She might be smaller, but she’s still enormous. That all goes without mentioning the power of a mother protecting her offspring. However, the babies would make for a welcome snack, not to mention the fact that they’re already in his territory. The mother stands frightened in his shadow, showing weakness. He could attack her. He could eat her hatchlings. He could do anything he wants…
He turns away from the young mother, grunting softly as if to tell her she and her brood are fine to stay. The female looks up at the old bull with surprise. Rooster looks back at them, but with no malicious intent. They don’t really present a threat. And sure, food was scarce up until ten minutes ago. This floodplain is huge, and every inch of it is stacked full of lungfish. Besides, Rooster feels merciful today. The mother makes a strange cooing sound as if to thank Rooster, then begins digging at the mud. As she does, a wave of squirming lungfish spring out of the wet ground. The little babies begin to feast on these panicking fish, grateful for a fulfilling meal. It isn’t long before the hatchlings themselves start scratching at the muddy ground and finding lungfish of their own. Unfortunately, they’re a lot bigger compared to the little hatchlings, making it difficult for them to catch these slippery fish. Still, they try and they try, and eventually the babies start making good progress. All the while, their mother encourages them.
Rooster watches them for a while, then turns away and begins pulling away more mud to release flopping lungfish for himself. However, once he awakens a good batch of the strange fish, one of the maroccanus hatchlings steals a fish from him. Rooster looks at the little baby, surprised and slightly offended. The mother sees what happened and panics. She quickly rushes over to her naughty child and picks it up with her mouth, nervously looking at the gargantuan bull that looms above her baby. She prepares herself for Rooster’s retaliation, sure that they have overstayed their welcome. However, yet again, Rooster just shakes it off as he hoists his hulking body away from the hatchlings and towards an untouched part of the floodplain. The mother stares in disbelief, wondering why a usually vicious and violent spinosaur bull was being so generous today.
A few days pass and the taste of lungfish gets old. The drought only intensified over the last few days, causing Rooster’s river to dry up even more. The extreme conditions force Rooster out of his territory to seek new hunting grounds with more water and more fish. So, on a belly full of lungfish, he set out, searching for a new river to terrorize. Only a few days into the trip and he’s already left the humid swamps and entered a relatively small desert, though it will still take a few more days for him to get across it. He’s not used to the dry conditions, though he doesn’t let them weigh him down. He’s a resilient predator. Few things can stop him.
On his travels, he encounters a herd of towering behemoths. Paralititans. These eighty-five foot long giants are sauropods; long-necked dinosaurs. They dwarf even the mighty Rooster, who’s a whopping sixty feet in length respectively. A full grown paralititan has almost no predators at all, though their juveniles are favored snacks of many of Northern Africa’s predators of this time. Luckily for these beasts of unfathomable proportions, Rooster has no interest in attacking any of them, even the babies. However, he notices some creatures who do not have that same idea in mind.
Rugops. In any other ecosystem, they’d be the largest predators around. Not here, though. These bulldog-faced predators are puny compared to Rooster, not even measuring up to half his length. Regardless, a group of them trail the herd of paralititans, hoping to score a meal. They couldn’t take down a full grown, healthy paralititan. However, if a sick one collapses or a young one falls behind, they might have a shot. Rooster has seen these scrawny predators everywhere. Sometimes they hunt by themselves. Other times they follow herds in groups, like these. But in some cases, they follow carcharodontosaurs in hopes of scavenging from the scraps the larger predators leave behind. These sickening little creeps keep Rooster cautious. He knows that if they’re here, it’s entirely possible something far bigger might be lurking here too.
The herd of magnificent paralititans passes by Rooster slowly, going the other direction. As they depart, the old bull notices a small group of rugops dinosaurs collected around a large carcass. Rooster hasn’t had a good meal in days, meaning a little scavenging might help cleanse his hunger. He runs towards the smaller carnivores hissing and growling, gnashing his teeth and brandishing his claws. The rugops group flees as soon as they see the massive monster charging towards them. This leaves the corpse unguarded. Rooster takes a moment to catch his breath before he turns towards the carcass-
He stops dead in his tracks. The male spinosaur is absolutely appalled by what he sees. There, lying in front of him, is the mangled yet fresh corpse of the female maroccanus he met only a few days before. Her neck is ripped apart and snapped. Her jaws are cracked in half. Part of her tail and sail are missing. One of her legs is bent backwards. Her ribcage has been pried open. Her flesh has been torn to shreds. The carcass is a bloody mess littered with clues to what her killer was, though Rooster has a good idea of what did this already. Ignoring the sickening sound of buzzing flies and the repulsive stench of rotting flesh, Rooster’s senses are locked onto a single tooth sticking out of the fallen female’s neck. It’s curved and serrated. Most of all, it’s huge. The spinosaurus turns away and looks at the ground around the dead mother. Footprints. Footprints everywhere. Some clearly belong to her babies. The others are far too big to even be a rugops. He knows what did this.
Carcharodontosaurus.
Based on the number of giant tracks, there had to have been at least two, maybe more. The footprints are so big that a single one covers up numerous infant footprints-
The babies.
Rooster begins to panic. He frantically looks all around but finds not a single piece of evidence relating to the brood other than their footprints. That means they may have gotten away…for now. He knows those babies have no chance without their mother, let alone against carcharodontosaurs. They’re probably already dead. And even if they aren’t, what could he do? Save them? Then what? Their mother is dead. He couldn’t take care of them, could he? Regardless, Rooster doesn’t waste his time on these petty thoughts. Though the footprints immediately around the corpse are frantic and random, there is a trail of baby footprints leading away from the scene and towards the hills. Carcharodontosaurus footprints trail behind them. Rooster takes off, following the trail of footprints up and over the hill. At the top, he sees what he feared to see.
From what he can tell, all the babies are still alive, but they won’t be for long. Two carcharodontosaurs circle around them. The carcharodontosaurs are massive. Each one is around forty feet in length; every inch of it is pure muscle. They look a lot more like a traditional carnivorous theropod; resembling a tyrannosaurus in many ways. However, they have many unique characteristics. Their arms are short but are tipped with three dagger-like claws. Their legs are long, strong, and powerful. Their heads are enormous, decorated with whitened brow ridges that greatly contrast from their orange skin color. Their huge, drooling mouths are filled with sharp teeth. They eye the baby spinosaurs with a great deal of hunger. They’ve waited very long for a good snack.
The brood hides under a low-hanging rock. Their shelter is narrow enough that the larger carnivores can’t break in. Still, the giant beasts try, butting their heads against the rock in an attempt to draw out the infants. Rooster watches in horror. If he doesn’t do something, they’ll die. Then again, what is he supposed to do? He’s designed to tackle fish prey. These monsters are masters of killing terrestrial animals like him. And he may be bigger than one of them, but the two of them combined are a deadly force to surely be reckoned with. If he isn’t careful, it could cost both his and the infants’ lives. One of the carcharodontosaurs beats its head against the rock again, shaking it brutally. The babies cower in fear. The dinosaur backs away, shaking its head. In a fit of anger, it rears up and begins to roar, but it’s interrupted by another strange roar.
A long, curved claw is thrusted into the throat of this screaming behemoth. Its calls are silenced as the war cry of Rooster overtakes it. The maroccanus brood watches awestruck as the gargantuan spinosaurus squares up his two opponents. The two carcharodontosaurs circle around Rooster, eyeing him as he eyes the two of them. Finally, one of the orange carnivores makes the first move, going in to bite the spinosaur’s tail. Luckily, Rooster is one step ahead of them, whacking his tail into the opponent’s legs. The carcharodontosaurus collapses as the other springs its attack; this one going for the spinosaur’s neck. Once again, Rooster dodges the attack. This time, he grabs the enemy’s neck and latches on with his teeth. The carcharodontosaurus howls as the spinosaurus sinks his claws and teeth into its neck. The other adversary has gotten back up at this point, but Rooster drags the one he already has captured in front of it. Then, he launches the captive carnivore at its ally, the two slamming together in a momentous thud.
The twin titans topple over, pounding against the ground. As they struggle to get up, Rooster unleashes his full fury upon them. The giant beast comes down on them, slashing his claws and snapping his jaws. He screams as he tears apart the two carcharodontosaurs. They are too bewildered to try to fight back, causing their torture to go on for longer and longer. Finally, the enemies rise back to their feet and retreat, knowing they have been beaten. Rooster roars once more triumphantly as the carcharodontosaurs hurry away. His greatest enemy on this great North African plain has finally been vanquished.
As Rooster stops to catch his breath, the frightened spinosaur babies slowly emerge from their hiding place. They cautiously surround the tired titan, looking up in awe and yet with fear at their savior. Rooster looks down at them, then begins to walk away. He still needs to find new hunting grounds. The maroccanus infants watch their enormous leader leave, not sure what to do. Their mother is gone. They’re stranded in a desert. They have nowhere to go. Then, when all seems lost, Rooster turns back at them and makes a soft cooing sound as if to beckon them to his side. The babies, filled with new hope, rush to his feet. The old bull waits patiently for each youngling to catch up, then sets back off with the brood trailing behind them. Together, they’ll find new hunting grounds on this ever-changing prehistoric world.
The End
Another spinosaurus tooth.
Notes and Acknowledgements:
First of all, this story wasn’t meant to be entirely scientifically accurate nor true in any form. Rather, it is a completely fictitious story based on a little bit of science. For one thing, the length estimate I assign Rooster (sixty feet) might be an outdated estimate for a real spinosaurus (I am not entirely sure). However, for the sake of this narrative, it will remain at what I have set it. Another thing I wanted to mention was the spinosaurus species spinosaurus maroccanus. From what I understand, this is not a valid species in the scientific world but rather one that has been proposed to exist in the past. For this narrative, my description of the maroccanus species is entirely fictitious, including the description and behavior. As for the description of spinosaurus as a whole; what we understand about spinosaurus is constantly changing (especially in 2023), and our description of it may change completely very soon. For now, my description of the dinosaur is based in some reality, though I admit to have taken some creative liberties with it. At the end of the day, this narrative is fiction and should be treated that way. It also should be noted that my description of spinosaurus and its behavior in this short story have been heavily inspired by Dr. David Hone and his colleagues’ description of the animal (which I have little doubt is also changing as I write this). Generally, thank you to all of those in the field of paleontology who have brought this ancient world into the light of day again.
Another great story. I love how your passion about dinosaurs and your imagination have joined to make this great story.