The research from "Friday's Guardian" discussed below was eventually published as:

Tarduno, J. A., D. B. Brinkman, P. R. Renne, R. D.
Cottrell, H. Scher, and P. Castillo, 1998, Evidence for
extreme climatic warmth from late Cretaceous Arctic
vertebrates. Science. vol. 282, no. 5397, pp. 2241-2244.

Re: Reptile Fossil Remains in the Arctic
Author:            Heinrich 
Date:              1998/12/20
Forum:             sci.archaeology
Message-ID:        
NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 20 Dec 1998 19:56:00 CST
Newsgroups:        sci.archaeology,alt.archaeology
Organization:      Intersurf Online, Inc.
References:        <367CE9D2.A62A100E@tschan-partner.com>

In article <367CE9D2.A62A100E@tschan-partner.com>, David Grayshan
 wrote:

+ Having been away on assignment, you have not heard
+ from me recently.  Weren't you lucky? Well, now your
+ peace is over.

+ Friday's Guardian reports the find of a reptile skeleton in the
+ Arctic. They seem pretty sure that it must have been a hot climate
+ there, relatively recently (the newspaper article does not provide
+ dates).

+ 1). Anyone with more info than the article provides?

I have read bits and pieces, but can't seem to find a
citation about this fossil at this time.  From what little
that I have found, the best that I can infer is that the
article is referring to a Champsosaur very similar to a
femur found on Axel Heiberg Island in the High Canadian
Arctic.  A brief on-line reference to this Champsosaur
can be found at:

"Arctic Journal Continued"
http://www.earth.rochester.edu/pmag/personnel/rory/journal2.htm

Champsosaurs were large, up to 15 feet long, crocodile-
like reptiles.

Some unrelated URLs about Champsosaurus are:

"Champsosaurus" at:
http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Lab/3095/champ.html

http://www.nps.gov/thro/tr_dinos.htm

"GHOSTS, GAPS AND CHAMPSOSAURS" at:
http://www.cmnh.org/fun/dinosaur-archive/1998Mar/msg00052.html

+ 2). Anyone got any theories?

..... unnecessary theories about volcanic activity omitted ...

+ No, the whole region must have been warm, not just the
+ bit around the location where it was found.

I will agree with that.

+ That is, the macroclimate must have been warm. And this
+ long after the supposed break-up of Pangea in current theory,
+ methinks.

The presence of Champsosaurs is not that surprising given
that the above mentioned Champsosaur was found strata
that is about 95 million years old.  The Mid-Cretaceous was
very likely one of the warmest periods of time in the last
600 million years of Earth history, e.g. Spicer (1992),
Ziegler et al. (1985), and many, many other citations.

Both Marincovich et al. (1990) and Thiede et al. (1990)
summarize data that show that the Arctic Ocean was
"remarkably warm and equable" during the Cretaceous
and early Tertiary.  The terrestrial climates were likely
mild temperate or warmer and lacked any prolonged spells
of freezing weather as indicated by dinosaur faunas, fossil
pollen, and fossil leaves.  During the Tertiary, the climate
gradually cooled until ice cover formed about 20 million
years after Antarctica was first glaciated.

At the South Pole, the Mid-Cretaceous climate was so
warm that Antarctica was completely ice-free.  During
this time, the Antarctic Peninsula was covered with a
"warm - cool temperate, high rainfall forest."  The
oceans the covered the area that later became James Ross
Island have been estimated to have temperatures of about
15 to 20 degrees Celsius using stable isotopes from
marine fossils (Dingle and Lavelle 1998, Ditchfield
et al. 1994).

+ One hesitates to mention the heretical idea that the Arctic
+ might not always have been located where it is now in
+ relatively recent times.

There are a number of models, supported by paleomagnetic
data, explaining how the Arctic Ocean developed.  However
all them show the Canadian High Arctic has for the last
150 millions moved within the Arctic Circle.  These are
summarized in Lawver and Scotese (1990).

+ 3). I always understood that the Arctic was just ice, no land
+ underneath. Yet the fossil is found in mud, meaning there
+ must be solid land under - or am I being naive?

There is an archipelago of islands, called the "High
Canadian Arctic," which lie within the Arctic Circle.
It on these that Champsosaurs are found.  The rest is the
Arctic Ocean.  For some pictures of these islands, go to:

"Arctic Expedition 96" at:
http://www.earth.rochester.edu/pmag/personnel/rory/myarctic.htm

and "Ph.D. project" at:
http://www.geo.ucalgary.ca/~macrae/current_projects.html#phd

References Cited:

Dingle, R. V., and Lavelle, M., 1998, Late Cretaceous -
Cenozoic climatic variations of the northern Antarctic
Peninsula: new geochemical evidence and review.
Palaeogeograpy, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology. vol. 141,
nos. 3-4, pp. 215-232.

Ditchfield, P. W., Marshall, J. D., and Pirrie, D., 1994,
High latitude palaeotemperature variation: new data from
the Tithonian to Eocene of James Ross Island, Antarctica.
Palaeogeograpy, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology. vol. 107,
nos. 1-2, pp. 79-101.

Lawver, L. A., and Scotese, C. R., 1990, A review of
tectonic models for the evolution of the Canadian Basin.
In A. Grantz, L. Johnson, and J. F. Sweeny, eds., pp. 593-
617, The Arctic Ocean Region. The Geology of North America,
vol. L, Geological Society of America, Boulder, Colorado.

Marincovich, L., Jr., Brouwers, E. M., Hopkins, D. M.,
and McKenna, M. C., 1990, Late Mesozoic and Cenozoic
paleogeographic and paleoclimatic history of the Arctic
Ocean Basin, based upon shallow-water marine faunas and
terrestrial vertebrates. In A. Grantz, L. Johnson, and J. F.
Sweeny, eds., pp. 403-426, The Arctic Ocean Region. The
Geology of North America, vol. L, Geological Society of
America, Boulder, Colorado.

Spicer, R. A., 1992, A Review of Terrestrial and Marine
Climates in the Cretaceous with Implications for Modeling
the `Greenhouse Earth. Geological Magazine, vol. 129,
no. 2, pp. 169-180.

Thiede, J., Clark, D. L., and Herman, Y., 1990, Late Mesozoic
and Cenozoic paleoceanography of the northern polar oceans.
In A. Grantz, L. Johnson, and J. F. Sweeny, eds., pp. 427-
458, The Arctic Ocean Region. The Geology of North America,
vol. L, Geological Society of America, Boulder, Colorado.

Ziegler, A.M., D. B. Rowley, A. L. Lottes, D. L. Sahagian,
M. L. Hulver, and T. C. Gierlowski, 1985. Paleogeographic
interpretation: with an example from the Mid-Cretaceous.
Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences. vol. 13,
pp. 385-425.

+ Paul (Heinrich), any comment?

Merry Christmas everybody.

Yours,

Paul V. Heinrich           All comments are the
heinrich@intersurf.com     personal opinion of the writer and
Baton Rouge, LA            do not constitute policy and/or
                           opinion of government or corporate
                           entities.  This includes my employer.

"To persons uninstructed in natural history, their country
or seaside stroll is a walk through a gallery filled with
wonderful works of art, nine-tenths of which have their faces
turned to the wall."
- T. H. Huxley



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