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We have an explanation for all 3194 xkcd comics, and only 61 (1.9%) are incomplete. Help us finish them!
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| Sauropods |
 Title text: Vertebrae Georg |
Explanation
This comic attempts to correct people on the skeletal structure of sauropod dinosaurs, claiming that most individuals actually had short necks and tails, and the "queen" of the colony had an enormous number of vertebrae, possibly resembling a snake with legs. The idea is that paleontologists misconstructed the skeletons, averaging the vertebrae out between all specimens, and not giving most of them to the queen.
The title-text references Spiders Georg, an internet meme character who eats 10,000 spiders per year, skewing the average, creating the factoid that "the average person swallows 3 spiders a year."
Transcript
[top panel with a sauropod with a normal long neck and tail, crossed out with a large red X]
[bottom panel with two sauropods with very short necks and tails, an eel-like sauropod queen composed of sauropod necks winding off both sides of the panel with a single head and tailtip visible, and a green checkmark]
[Caption below the comic:]
"Thanks to modern paleontological reconstructions, we now know that most Sauropods had short necks, and all those extra vertebrae belonged to the Sauropod colony's queen."
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