Is there a dinosaur alive in Africa?

The reasons for disbelief stated here are ridiculous.

Please note that the Ice Ages DID NOT kill off the dinosaurs. They were dead and gone a LONG time before.

Everything from the time of the dinos DID NOT die off, and most have remained practically unchanged since that time. A prehistoric shark is still recognized as being VERY much the same as a modern shark. The same goes for the lizards and fishes.

Believing that only one of a species has survived this long is preposterous. It's incredible that this is the sticking point for most people in this thread. Why would anyone assume that there is only one? In my opinion that is what makes most lake serpents not believable. Most lakes are crawling with people or surrounded by us, we would see serpents all the time (because they would have to have a large enough population to be sustainable). Sasquatch has all of North America to roam and breed in, that makes him more believable.

And Mokele has all of the Congo. A HUGE area that is almost completely unmapped. This is a area full of lakes that could easily hide a large breeding population. Mokele is supposed to be amphibious in nature (not an amphibian, just amphibious), and the high density forest would also cover their tracks out of water.

To top it off they are supposed to be pretty much common knowledge to natives, so there are many more eyewitnesses then most "investigators" would care to admit. It's not the eyewitness's fault that they are not "cultured" or of European decent, but that is usually why their testimony is discounted.

One last point to make here is that just recently a new type of ape was found in this very same area of the world. They were considered a myth or an outlandish story at first, but now (just within the last year or so) they were accepted as fact (read: a few were captured). Here is the post on them: www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by Paresthesia


Maybe the idea of millions of years is absurd! and then the reports of the "dino" is not that absurd anyway!

reply to post by whargoul


Exactly what I was going to say.

No one is claiming that there is only one of these things. Lets not forget that the swamp that "it" is said to inhabit is nearly un-trekable and also the size of texas. So there is plenty of room for an animal to hide.

The idea that a dinosaur species is still alive is preposterous?

Explain this!?


[edit on 5/21/2008 by JPhish]

Is there a dinosaur alive in Africa?

Well IMO, I don't think there is, unless it's a small species.


Also, the show Destination Truth hosted by Josh Gates, aired on the SciFi channel spent half an episode on the Mokèlé-mbèmbé, a supposed Brontosaurus-like dinosaur. I saw the episode and they were on Lake Bangweulu and filmed what looked to be a very large animal or serpent in the distance. It looked quite compelling, but once Gates and his team got back to the US, they cleaned up the frame in the video and saw clearly that what they caught where a group of hippos.

The findings were not surprising to me and I don't see a dinosaur or immense proportions living anywhere on earth (maybe in the deep ocean) because they would need a lot of food and would get spotted quite easily.


Here's the link to the episode of Destination Truth on the Mokèlé-mbèmbé.
www.scifi.com...

The amount of damage a herd of large sauropods would inflict on the environment would be devastating. All they did was eat. There bodies would process tons of vegetation. Then of course there would be mounds and mounds of the outcome of all this eating.

As with most sightings of this kind (as well as in criminal investigations), you need more than eyewitness testimony. Just not reliable.

I don't believe that dinosaurs are still alive in the world anywhere- there is absolutely no solid reliable proof at all for such claims. The main argument pro-dinosaur survivor people seem to be saying here is that its possible for dinosaurs to have survived- but this is a ridiculous argument, you can't wholeheartedly believe in something just because its possible.

People have been arguing that dinosaurs could still survive somewhere in a remote jungle in some part of the world since the Victorian times, and despite the hundreds of intrepid explorers and researchers since those times, increasingly all the evidence we find points to dinosaurs not surviving in the modern world rather than surviving.
People assume that if dinosaurs still existed, they'd probably be in some remote tropical jungle- but this in itself is silly, since almost all current remote jungles that exist today have not been jungles constantly since the dinosaur times, so its not like dinosaurs would have survived in seemingly stable habitats, because even the most stable of habitats have changed greatly since dino times.

Dinosaurs were a dying breed long before the final meteorite/asteroid finished them off, all the evidence we have found so far suggests that large important groups of dinosaurs were dying off over a period of hundreds of thousands (even millions) of years before the final impact. Even if the meteorite/asteroid which finished the dinosaurs off hadn't come, its likely there would have been large scale mass extinctions and a possibility that the dinosaurs would die off anyway, since this was already naturally happening. They were simply getting out-competed by newly evolving more modern animals like birds and new types of mammals etc.

Trying to argue that dinosaurs have somehow survived in some remote part of the world (despite all the massively overwhelming evidence that they have not) is like trying to argue that somewhere someplace in the world the giant terror birds, sabretooth cats and hoofed carnivores of prehistoric times still exist somewhere in the world (also despite overwhelming evidence that they do not).

Face it- dinosaurs are dead. There are no dinosaurs, terror birds, hoofed carnivores, giant ground sloths, walking whales etc left alive.
On the bright side though, at least there are the birds- try and appreciate them, they're the closest you'll ever get to meeting living dinosaurs.

Originally posted by IrvingTheExplainer
The amount of damage a herd of large sauropods would inflict on the environment would be devastating. All they did was eat. There bodies would process tons of vegetation. Then of course there would be mounds and mounds of the outcome of all this eating.

I do agree with you that the amount of damage would be very significant. However, if you use Google Earth to survey the area of the Congo you will find large paths / patches of missing vegetation. And unfortunately the images are not detailed enough to view the ground.

Remember that an acre of vegetation would be very noticeable in a populated or travelled area. However an acre in an area of that size is like a blade of gras missing from your lawn. The area is not travelled or explored and as was posted on another thread any locals, in fear, would not dare explore the area.

As far as the "droppings" go, this area again is widely unexplored. There is every reason to believe that there are insects / animals / even vegetation that deal with this. If a "dinosaur" can go without being seen why can't some other creatures that thrive of the "droppings" exist.

Just some thoughts.

Then there's the fact that it seems that this animal lives in the water. Or does it just cross the water. Can't quite figure that out. I don't recall any dinosaurs living in water.

Also, no bones have been found. I would at least think the native population would come across them and use them as tools or in ceremonies.

I remember when Jurassic Park came out one of the "rags" had an article on the cover that said scientists find (or clone...I don't remember) an Iguanadon. And show a photo of an enlarged iguana in the jungle. Of course, the average 6 year old knows iguanadons don't look anything like iguanas.

I'm a dinosaur nut and growing up in the 70s, I lived for stories of sea and lake monsters and these African dinosaur tales that I found in library books. I tried to convince myself they were plausible, but today, I'm not too sure.

I'm sure no dinosaurs "survived" this long or even evolved. Maybe there are some brand new animals out there that we just haven't come across yet.

These things are suppose to be somewhere in size between a Hippo/Rhino and an Elephant. As far as noticeable damage to the jungle from their eating I would guess (if they exist) they would do no more damage then Elephants (which do live in the same area). Maybe they are like Tigers, solitary for most of their lives and only get together to bread. I recently saw a good wildlife special on Black Rhinos, which for the most part are solitary. But the woman on the show found a place where they gather together at night which until now had been unheard of.

While I love shows like Monster Quest and Destination Truth I don’t think you can use them as the end all beat all source for deciding if something exists or not, they spend what? a week looking for something and make their little jerry Springer speech at the end of the show on whether or not they think its real based on that?

Would it be better if people didn't call these things living Dinosaurs? How about big ass lizards? Would that be easier to wrap your brain around? We know there are 20 ft plus Crocs, snakes pushing 30ft maybe more. How hard is it to think that there could be another kind of reptile out there that’s big and we know nothing of. As far as the jungle not having always been in the same place there’s this nutty things animals do called migrate. If the food/habitat goes south for them in one area they move to greener pastures so to speak.

These things basically live (again, if they exist) in a huge swamp. When is the last time you saw a Crocodiles corpse or even an Elk or Bear for that matter. Nature has a wonderful way of cleaning up after itself. We find new species all the time, BIG new species. Not just bugs and frogs and small stuff. So who knows....

How do we know alligators, crocodiles, komodo dragons, iguanas, etc aren't dinosaurs?

Originally posted by ghostryder21
the reason i find it hard to believe in this or nessie or the dino in south america is how can 1 of a species survive? are they antisocial against their own kind??

Is it so unreal to imagine?

'Virgin births' for giant lizards

There have been two reported cases of Komodo dragon "virgin births"


Komodo dragons
The largest lizards in the world are capable of "virgin births".
Scientists report of two cases where female Komodo dragons have produced offspring without male contact.

Tests revealed their eggs had developed without being fertilised by sperm - a process called parthenogenesis, the team wrote in the journal Nature.

news.bbc.co.uk...

Most reptiles reproduce sexually, though some are capable of asexual reproduction.

en.wikipedia.org...

Just saying I wouldn't rule it out as impossible for these creatures to have developed asexual reproduction. But, rarely a few survive.

reply to Jake

I believe you man, there might be dinosuars
how did crocdiles lived they lived at the exact same time as dinosaurs
I think dinosuars might be able to live i think there is one in every
jungle hiding from us thinking that we look ugly to us there the ugly ones
i think only plant eaters are alive if there were meat eaters we would be already dead by now!

IMO this picture of the supposed african mokele membe looks very convincing .........

reply to post by Heavenly Orbit


What is the source of that picture? Is there a link, explanations etc.?

Interesting picture..is that a still from a video?

I have had that image on Photobucket for a long time, thinking that it had been proven a hoax, but after looking into it I cant find anything on it, no source that I can find.

If its a fake it very well done.

After an extensive google images search I have found the same picture in colour, although it is alot smaller.

reply to post by Heavenly Orbit



That there picture is an elephant in da water. Its all I can say without one line. But, there are big snakes out there that natives say are dinosaurs. And a few unknow bigfish.