iris.ws 🦖 Pet Corner
A very, very old story
🦷 Dinosaurs grew new teeth their whole lives, and sharks still do it today 🦖 Our newsroom pet is 115 million years old and has never once been late 🌍 The word "fossil" comes from Latin and means "dug up" 🐊 Some crocodiles back then were longer than a bus 🏜️ The Sahara Desert was once full of rivers, forests and giants 📚 Word of the day: palaeontologist 🦷 Dinosaurs grew new teeth their whole lives, and sharks still do it today 🦖 Our newsroom pet is 115 million years old and has never once been late 🌍 The word "fossil" comes from Latin and means "dug up" 🐊 Some crocodiles back then were longer than a bus 🏜️ The Sahara Desert was once full of rivers, forests and giants 📚 Word of the day: palaeontologist
🐦‍⬛
Big news. Every proper newspaper has an office pet. Some have a goldfish. Some have a cat. Ours is a dinosaur, a real one, and today it has agreed to its very first interview. It said nothing the whole time, which is exactly what the wisest ones do.
🦖 Meet the Newsroom Pet
🦖 ✨ ✨ ✨ ✨
Official Pet Profile

The iris.ws Dinosaur

  • Kind of dinosaur:An abelisaur, a cousin of Tyrannosaurus rex
  • Age:About 115 million. We don't know its exact birthday, so we celebrate all of them
  • Old address:The Kem Kem river country, Morocco, North Africa
  • New address:Ireland, which is much safer and has better snacks nearby
  • Size:One tooth, 2.4 cm long. It's the part that lives here, and it's curved, sharp and older than the ocean
  • Owner & guardian:Iris. It's official, because there's a certificate
  • Name:Iris knows it. The newspaper is still waiting to be told
  • Scout's rating:10/10, the best listener I have ever met

🐦‍⬛ Scout says: It liked that. It's hard to tell, I know, but trust me. I'm a professional.

It doesn't need feeding, walking or trips to the vet. It is 115 million years old and has never once had an accident on the carpet. It's the perfect pet.

📖 Its Life Story (So Far)
🌿
Chapter One · 115 million years ago

A dinosaur goes hunting

Long, long before people, before the Atlantic Ocean was even finished, a young abelisaur prowled a land of enormous rivers, thick forests and steamy swamps. It ran on two powerful legs, had a thick heavy skull, funny little arms, and jaws lined with rows of curved, sharp teeth. It was fast. It was strong. It was very good at its job.

🦷
Chapter Two · One ordinary day

A tooth falls out

Dinosaurs grew new teeth their whole lives, the way sharks do. When one wore out, it simply dropped out and a fresh one grew in. So one day, in the middle of an adventure, this tooth fell from the dinosaur's jaw and landed in the soft mud beside a river. The dinosaur didn't even notice. It had plenty more.

🪨
Chapter Three · Very slowly indeed

The tooth turns to stone

Sand and mud settled over it, layer after layer, year after year. Squeezed in the dark, the tooth slowly became rock itself. That is what a fossil is: a little piece of a real dinosaur, kept perfectly safe by the Earth.

🌑
Chapter Four · The long quiet

115 million years of waiting

Underground, in the dark, in total silence, the tooth waited. Above it, the last dinosaurs came and went. Mountains rose. The rivers dried up and became the Sahara Desert. The first people appeared and built everything you've ever seen. The tooth just waited. Patient is not a big enough word for it.

🔦
Chapter Five · Not long ago

Found at last

In the desert of Morocco, where the rivers used to run, a fossil hunter dug down and found it. It was small, curved and as sharp as the day it fell. After 115 million years, the tooth was back in the sunshine.

🎁
Chapter Six · Easter 2026

It comes home to Iris

The tooth travelled all the way to Ireland and was presented to Iris on her ninth birthday, with a certificate making her its rightful owner and guardian. After the longest wait in the history of waiting, it finally belongs to someone.

This is the best chapter by miles. Everything before it was just the journey here.

🌍 The Old Neighbourhood
🦖💪
The Family

The Abelisaurs

This is our pet's own family: meat-eaters with thick, heavy skulls, powerful legs and famously tiny arms. They were cousins of T. rex, and just as serious about dinner. They hunted right in the heart of the most dangerous place on Earth.

They had short arms and a big attitude. I respect that, because I haven't got arms at all.

🦖🌊
Next Door

Spinosaurus

This was the biggest meat-eating dinosaur that ever lived, with jaws like a crocodile, claws like meat hooks and a huge sail on its back. It hunted in the very same rivers our pet drank from. Imagine that over the garden fence.

It was bigger than T. rex. They don't put that on the posters enough.

🐟🚗
In the River

Fish as Long as Cars

The rivers of Kem Kem were packed with giant fish, some as long as a car, with scales like armour plates. To a hungry Spinosaurus they were dinner. To everyone else they were a very good reason to learn to swim fast.

And I get nervous about herring gulls.

🐊🚌
On the Bank

Crocodiles Longer Than Buses

Lying on the riverbanks were crocodiles bigger than any alive today, some longer than a bus. Scientists call this whole neighbourhood one of the most dangerous places that has ever existed on Earth. Our pet lived there and didn't seem to mind.

And now it lives with Iris, where the most dangerous thing is bath night.

⏳ Just How Old Is This Pet?
Deep Time

Its whole life, in one rainbow bar

The bar below is the tooth's entire 115-million-year story, from falling out to today. Look how far along everything else has to squeeze in.

  • Far left: the tooth falls out (115 million years ago)
  • Not even halfway along: the very last dinosaurs (66 million years ago)
  • The final sliver: the first people ever. All of castles, pyramids, ice cream and Ireland fits in there
  • The very last dot: Iris ❤️
  • It's older than the Atlantic Ocean
  • It's older than every mountain you have ever seen
  • When this tooth fell out, the dinosaurs still had about 50 million years of adventures left

I'm four. I thought I'd seen things.

🎲 Pet Bits
Would You Rather…

Have a pet dinosaur, or a pet dragon?

🐦‍⬛ Scout says: That's the correct answer. Dinosaurs are real, and this newspaper happens to know where you can see one.

🐦‍⬛ Scout says: Ooh, that's bold. But dragons are made up, and dinosaurs really existed. Iris's dinosaur is real too, so I win.

Pet Care Guide
  • Feeding: none, ever. It's extremely good value
  • Walks: none. It has done enough travelling already
  • Baths: no thank you. It's been dry for 115 million years and likes it that way
  • Likes: careful hands, being shown to visitors, and quiet
  • Dislikes: being dropped

It's the best-behaved pet I have ever interviewed, and I once interviewed a goldfish.

Word of the Day
palaeontologist
PAY·lee·on·TOL·uh·jist

A palaeontologist is a scientist who studies fossils to work out what the world was like long, long ago. If you own a fossil, know where it came from and can tell its whole story, you're basically one already.

It takes ten years at university, or one very good birthday present.

📜 The Official Papers
Inspected & Approved

Certificate of Ancient Earth: the details

This newspaper has examined the pet's paperwork very seriously, with a magnifying glass. Everything is in order.

  • Species:Abelisaur. Scientists write it Abelisaur sp. indet., which means "definitely one of those, still working out exactly which"
  • Big family tree:Theropoda, the great family of two-legged meat-eaters, the same as T. rex
  • Found in:Kem Kem Basin, Morocco, North Africa
  • Rock layer:Tegana Formation, a layer of stone that works like a page of Earth's diary
  • Age:About 115 million years (the Middle Cretaceous)
  • Tooth length:2.4 cm
  • Condition:Naturally shed. Nobody pulled it, it fell out on its own, the way yours do
  • Status:Adopted ❤️ Easter 2026 · Owner & guardian: Iris

This is the most official pet in Ireland, and possibly the world. I've filed the paperwork under W, for Wow.

"The Earth remembers everything."

🌈 Back to iris.ws