The Real Jurassic Park

A fossil bonanza in northwestern China shows that the ancestors of T. rex and other reptile giants started small.

Perhaps the shriek of a dying animal enticed the dinosaur into the trap. Or maybe it was the scent of rotting flesh. Whatever the bait, once the predator was lured into the mud pit, it quickly forgot its prey. It thrashed futilely in the mire for a long while, but its legs couldn’t reach the bottom. Doomed, the animal slowly accepted its fate and succumbed to exposure, but not before its struggle attracted another predator to the pit, continuing the cycle of the death trap. Eventually the mud turned to stone, entombing its victims, stacked one on top of another, for 160 million years.