Tiny Mammal, Big Dinosaurs: A Cretaceous Tale

Welcome to the Jennifer Joy podcast where science meets art.

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For this episode, I was curious about the mammals that existed at the same time as the dinosaurs. What might their lives have been like? After doing some research, I was inspired to write this story. Enjoy.

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Minda crouched in the tree; her heart pounding frantically fear.

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At the end of the branch on which she was perching, a Brachiosaurus chomped leaves with its wickedly long teeth.

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The long-necked dinosaurs often grazed the treetops, but not usually at night, when the mammals were out. Flee? Minda scooted back further into the hole that was her home as the huge jaws of the Brachiosaurus loomed closer, nipping away at the foliage that Minda hid behind.

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Normally, brachiosaurae wouldn't eat animals, but Minda could not be absolutely sure that she wouldn't be gobbled up with the next mouthful of leaves. Suddenly, another Brachiosaurus let out a cry, and the one approaching Minda turned his head.

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He bellowed in reply. To Minda's trembling relief, he lumbered away, the ground quaking and her tree shaking with his every step.

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Minda was a small mammal and was one of the ancestors of primates and therefore humans. Our forebears were among the smallest animals on the planet during the Cretaceous period of the Mesozoic era, 65 million to 130 million years ago. When full grown, these little mammals were the size of a large squirrel and had furry bodies and long bushy tails. They had whiskers, a long snout and cute folded back ears. They had an excellent sense of smell, though they could only see black, white and blue, their vision was well adapted for a nighttime scavenging of insects and fruit. Night was always the safest time for them, since most of the dinosaurs were asleep.

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These small mammals lives held some pleasures and some dangers. There were many ways for mammals to be killed in the forest. A Madtsoia Bai, a snake that was several meters long could slither up quickly and silently behind a little animal and swallow it so fast it barely had time to squeak.

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A Quetzalcoatlus, a 573-pound bird with a long, nasty beak, could swoop down suddenly and clamp onto a small mammal with that beak and gobble it up in one gulp.

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or a Deltatheroidans, a nocturnal mammal the size of a house cat, could leap upon a smaller mammal and chomp into it with its sharp bladelike teeth. And that was just the predators. There were also the accidents. The ground-shaking several ton dinosaurs sometimes inadvertently knocked the tiny mammals from their perch in the trees. The mammals might break their necks on the fall down, or they might land on the ground to be quickly spotted and eaten, a little snack for the huge dinosaurs. Or a falling mammal might land safely and not get eaten, only to end up crushed, unseen under the foot of a hulking, several ton beast.

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But Minda’s life was not just fearful and violent. She also experienced care, curiosity and playfulness, inventions of evolution that assured that even the smallest and most put upon creatures of the Mesozoic would do more than survive. One day they would take center stage on the planet and truly thrive.

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Minda could not remember much about the first moments of her life. If she could, she would have remembered leaving a sweet swimming warmth and landing suddenly on something hard and cold. She would have remembered fear and panic- grief and pain, but then

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Care. A warm mouth licked and cleaned her. A soft body, much larger than hers, soothed her. Mother.

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And she wasn't alone with mother, her wiggly companion from the sweet swimming warmth was there too.

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Soon enough, hunger, this crawling feeling in the belly, made Minda seek. Somehow she knew the food was there. Ah, nursing. Care, calm, almost as good as that sweet swimming warmth. Almost.

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For a long time, Minda and her brother Jako stayed in the little nest their mother had made. It was a cozy hole far up in a tree. They slept a lot. Their mother left them alone at night, and they were often afraid. The first time she left, they both panicked. Where was she going? They made high squeaks of protest, and she hurried back and comforted them, but then she left again, and they panicked again, but this time she did not come back. They shivered with the fear and pain of being left alone in this strange world for hours.

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They finally fell asleep, curled tightly around each other, exhausted from their terror. When they woke, she was back again. Relief flooded them, and they snuggled close to her and nursed. Comfort.

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But she left again the next night and the next. While they protested less, they never, ever got used to it. They always feared she would disappear entirely and leave them alone in this strange, hard, cold world.

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When Minda and Jako were a month old, their mother took them out of the nest for the first time. Minda and Jako felt fear, but they also felt a new sensation. Curiosity. Their mother showed them a small pile of dinosaur dung on the ground.

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She burrowed into the pile and found a juicy, squirmy centipede. She emerged with the bug showing the kids, and then gobbled it up. The kids were afraid, but very curious. Minda crept forward and began digging. She had good instincts for burrowing. With her mother's help, she tunneled down and found a smaller beetle. She caught it in her mouth and was rewarded with a burst of delicious flavor. She surfaced from her hole and flicked her tail back and forth happily. Jako soon followed suit and found a beetle as well.

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But insects didn't seem to fill their bellies. The next night, their mother taught Minda and Jako to scamper among the branches of the trees searching for fruit. At first, the kids hesitated, fearful of the long drop below them. They moved slowly along the branches, finding their footing. But after a few nights, their tentativeness had vanished. They were born to leap from branch to branch, and it was fun. Hungry or not, the kids became very playful. When they met other kids, they raced off through the treetops with them while their mother collected fruit. Sometimes their mother would get mad at them, but most of the time they were happy.

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Still, danger was a constant in their lives. Though their mother taught Minda and Jako many things she never had to teach them what to do when faced with a predator. Their bodies just knew to scurry away when the beasts were still far enough away not to notice them and to freeze when a dinosaur got too close.

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They just knew that they shouldn't try to fight a dinosaur. No matter how sharp their little teeth were, they were no match for a creature as big as a skyscraper with teeth like swords glittering in its mouth.

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Their reactions to danger were instantaneous and out of their conscious control, which is why this species and their ancestors, dating back 300 million years, had survived.

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When the kids were three months old, tragedy struck. Minda and Jako and their mother were rummaging through a large pile of dinosaur manure for the juicy beetles that always burrowed an inch or two beneath the surface. Jako and their mother were especially determined digging further into the pile than Minda did.

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So Minda heard and even saw the Quetzalcoatlus. Her mother and brother did not. Minda froze. The Quetzalcoatlus didn't notice her, but Jako's flashing tail caught the creature's eye. In one fast scoop, it grabbed Jako in its sharp beak. It tipped back its head, and Jaco fell into the Quetzalcoatlus’ throat with a frightened squeak. Minda’s terror spiraled as she saw her mother emerge from the pile. The Quetzalcoatlus spotted her mother too. As it leaned down to clamp its sharp beak onto her mother's body, Minda passed out.

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Collapsing and looking dead was the last and most ancient line of defense built into her nervous system, and it worked.

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After the Quetzalcoatlus swallowed Minda’s mother, it sauntered off, never noticing Minda.

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When Minda regained consciousness, she was momentarily confused. She looked around for her mother and her brother. Then the memory of Jako disappearing down that creature's throat hit her. She started digging through the manure pile, trying to find her mother. She squeaked quietly, calling for her. She could not find her mother, and then she started shaking. There was a bad feeling, both scared and hurt, a brand-new ache that was not from hunger or from falling off a branch. She blindly stumbled back to the tree she'd once shared with her family, climbed back into their familiar hole, and sat there all night, shaking and quivering. She fell asleep sometime near dawn.

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14 hours later, her stomach woke her. She felt ravenously hungry and strangely alone. She looked around frantically for her mother and Jako, but then she remembered what had happened to Jako. But where was her mother?

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Panic, grief, her hunger turned to nausea. She curled into a tight little ball and shivered herself back to sleep.

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She was awakened the next night by the Brachiosaurus. She was exhausted and hungry, and upon seeing the Brachiosaurus, terrified. Where was her mother? She wondered. Then she remembered Jako and the Quetzalcoatlus and the tiny squeak.

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Minda felt rage fill her mind. She wanted to fight something. She edged out on the branch. She wanted to claw, bite, lash out, but then the large, large mouth of the Brachiosaurus yawned, and the sharp teeth glinted in the moonlight. Fear flashed through her. She froze, but then carefully backed up.

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She pressed herself back into her hole, curled up tightly, and waited for the creature to pass.

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On the third night after Jako had died and her mother had disappeared, Minda woke with a hunger in her belly that was greater than any she had ever experienced. She was terribly alert. Her nervous energy drove her out of her hiding place. The hunger was such that at the moment, Minda felt little grief or fatigue. She just felt the urgency of her empty belly. She struggled to remember everything her mother had taught her. She remembered a grove of ginkgo trees not far from her little home. It had round fruit that was bitter but filled the belly. There was also the marsh with a wealth of insects, but it was further away and on the ground.

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With a shiver of fear, Minda decided to find the ginkgo grove. When she found the ginkgo trees, she saw that there were other little mammals there already, some she had played with. She immediately felt afraid. She had never encountered other animals without her mother. She thought about going back home, but her hunger was great. She crept forward and one of her former playmates, Russo, bounced across a branch to meet her. He was flicking his tail back and forth, ready for more play and fun. But Minda crouched on her branch, afraid and sad and hungry.

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Russo backed up a few paces and then turned around and made his own way down to a patch of fruit.

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She followed. They ate together. After she was full, Minda sat there quietly. Russo reached over and started cleaning her fur, as Minda's mother used to. Minda felt a wave of panic and grief. She turned silently on her branch and ran all the way home.

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The next night, Minda wandered through the trees looking for fruit. She kept smelling large piles of dinosaur manure, but every time she smelled it, she felt waves of fear and pain, so she didn't descend from the treetops. When she arrived at the gingko grove, again, Russo was there. There was no fruit left there, though, and so they both moved on. Minda hadn't meant to bring her friend with her, but he seemed intent on joining her, so she let him. They came across another fruit tree that had round, sweet, red fruit. They ate their fill.

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Russo cleaned her fur again, and she cleaned his a little too. She began to feel better.

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A week later, Russo followed her all the way home. Minda was a little angry. She did not want to share her family's home with him or anyone. So before she went into her little hole, she turned around and snapped at Russo with her sharp little teeth. He pulled back, afraid, he scuttled away.

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He stayed away a few nights after that. They ran into each other again, though, at the red fruit tree. It was on a night when Minda actually felt better. She ate her fill, and then she and Russo raced through the treetops together.

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Near dawn, they found a hole in a tree that seemed to be unoccupied. They curled up together and fell asleep. Minda felt comfort for the first time since her mother and brother had died.

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The next night, as she and Russo scurried through the trees looking for a meal, a particularly strong scent of dinosaur dung drifted up through the branches. Russo stopped and sniffed to the air. He peered through the branches and seeing no dinosaurs, he scampered to the nearest tree trunk and climbed down.

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Minda watched him and felt very afraid. He whistled up to her in confusion. Why wasn't she following? Here was a tasty meal of bugs, to be sure.

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But Minda was frozen on the branch. The waves of panic and grief washed through her. She couldn't move.

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After a few minutes, she calmed down, but there was no way she was going down to the ground. She looked for food up in the branches. She found a few ginkgo fruits and a couple of insects that burrow in bark. It wasn't a full meal, but she was not going back down on the ground. Ever.

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She and Russo continued to snuggle in their new home. One night, she experienced a new feeling. Lust. Wow. Russo felt it too. Lust was joy and caring and spicy fun, very spicy fun. She and Russo played in entirely new ways.

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In the next weeks, Minda found that she was not as fast. She was hungry all the time, and she felt heavy and tired. Where Russo still wanted to play, all Minda wanted to do was eat. She was irritated when Russo wanted to have spicy fun too. All Minda wanted was food and more food. She still staunchly refused to leave the treetops. And so she started wandering further and further from their home in search of fruit. One night, after trotting for hours through the treetops, she found a tree so full of delicious fruit, she finally felt full. She didn't return to her home with Russo that night. She wanted to stay close to her food. She found a new hole and remained there as she grew larger and larger.

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Finally, one night, she gave birth. She was amazed at the tiny creatures that came out of her. There were four of them. She felt a new feeling, care, deep care. It was a powerful feeling, more powerful than even what she had felt for her mother. The feeling made her forget everything else, Russo and even most of the time her mother and brother.

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At first, she nursed her babies in their nest. She felt that deep care feeling again and again, but she still had to leave them at night, above their protests to get food for herself.

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She did not like it much more than they did, but she was driven by hunger.

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After a month, she was able to take her children out for nighttime gathering, just as her mother had taken her out. They were very curious about their world. She taught them about eating fruit and bugs in the trees. She taught them about Brachiosauruses pulling leaves off the trees, and about other dangerous dinosaurs. She taught them to avoid these beasts, or to freeze or flee, but not to try to fight them.

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She tried to teach them not to leave the trees. Whenever one of them started to venture down the tree trunks, she gave a squeal of panic and pain, and at first, they scampered right back up the branches, but the urge to burrow was very strong. As time went on, some of her children defied her and ventured down to the ground again. This filled Minda with panic, but there was nothing she could do.

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Eventually, her progeny split into those that remained in the treetops and those that rebelled and joined the other burrowers. Minda had four more litters of children over the next few years. Some of them listened to her and did not leave the treetops. Others rebelled. Her progeny split into two branches. Those that lived in the trees and those that eventually became burrowers rarely going into the trees.

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Sadly, when the comet fell, the tree-dwelling branch of her family mostly died in the global firestorm that followed. But the rebels, who by then had created complex tunnels and burrows underground, survived and were able to flourish in the aftermath of the dinosaurs’ extinction.

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Thank you so much for listening. I'm Jennifer Joy. I wrote and performed this story, and my sound engineer was Saga Legin. You can listen to more episodes of the Jennifer Joy Podcast on any podcast platform.

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Now, for this episode, I created a special behind-the-scenes podcast because a lot of science-minded people question whether this little mammal might have had the emotions that I write about in this story. I do have a science-based reason for this, so if you sign up for exclusive content, you can get access to the episode where I'm exploring the research around the evolution of emotions in mammals. Go to Jenniferjoypodcast.com and sign up for exclusive content, and you'll get the link. Also on Jenniferjoypodcast.com you'll be able to access more content, including written stories, videos and performances where science meets art.