Recent discoveries of fossilized sauropod skin (diplodocid) impressions reveal a very different appearance for these dinosaurs. The fossilized skin demonstrates that a median row of spines was present over the tail and may have continued along the body and neck. This gives these dinosaurs an ornamental profile of dermal spines.

The discoveries were made by the Sauria Museum of Aathal Switzerland, and paleontologist Stephen Czerkas, at the Howe Quarry in Wyoming. Czerkas published a preliminary report in Geology in December of 1992, and then a complete report in Gaia in December of 1994.