SAN DIEGO — He’s discovered many animal fossils. But to have a species bear his name?
University of California San Diego paleontologist Dick Norris didn’t see that coming.
“My mom is tickled pink and I think my father would have been very delighted,” said Norris, a researcher at UCSD’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
He is the son of the late Ken Norris, one of the most revered figures in the history of marine mammal research.
An ancient whale species that had been mislabeled long ago has been renamed Norrisanima mioceana to correct the record and honor the father-son duo’s contributions to science and teaching.
The change was made by Swarthmore College biologist Matthew Leslie, who became enthralled by Dick Norris’ teaching ability while he was earning his doctorate at Scripps.
“Dick has this exuberance that is infectious,” said Leslie, who studies the evolution of whales. “He gets students out in the field, gets their hands dirty, gets their boots muddy. It gives students a sense of agency about natural history. I know it was huge for me.”
After he left Scripps, Leslie did postdoctoral research at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., the very institution that had misidentified an extinct whale species a century ago.
The Smithsonian called the species Megaptera miocaena, believing that it was an ancient relative of today’s humpback whales. The decision was based on an analysis of fossils that had been collected from the Santa Barbara area.
Leslie took a closer look and came up with a different conclusion.
“On the surface, the (whale) does resemble a modern day humpback,” Leslie said. “But we examined every bone in the skull and compared things to other living and extinct whales. It became clear that this wasn’t a relative of the humpback.”
But it was a fascinating species. As Leslie notes, “It seems to be one of the very earliest groups of whales that were getting gigantic in size. It could have been 15 to 20 feet long. We don’t know for sure.”
He elaborated in a statement to Scripps, saying, “Norrisanima was unearthed exactly 100 years ago, and ever since, because of its Miocene age and large size, it has been an important piece of the tale of how whales evolved.
“Unfortunately, for much of the last century, it has had an inaccurate name, which confuses everyone … We know this whale was big before other whales were big. Now, the name reflects that.”
Leslie had a small model of the animal’s skull made and sent it to Dick Norris, letting him know about the name change.
“He called me about a month ago and told me he was sending me something,” Norris said. “He was very cagey about it, so I didn’t know what it was. When the model showed up, I thought, ‘Wow, that’s very sweet of him.’ I have had other fossils named after me. But they were microfossils! This is quite an honor.”
He also prizes his friendship with Leslie, saying, “He’s always got a grin on his face. He has fun. I respect that in researchers. Some of them can be very grim about their field. You can pursue good science and still have fun.”
