Re: re:dino mimicry

[ornstn@hookup.net (Ronald Orenstein)]

Tom Holtz writes:

>One problem I have with this mimicry idea is the biogeography of it -
>ankylosaurIDs with good tail-clubs are not common where "iguanodontids" are
>found.  Instead, ankylosaurids are found with ceratopsians, hadrosaurids,
>hypsilophodontids, pachycephalosaurs, a butt-load (standard paleoecological
>term... ;-)) of small theropods, and the occasional sauropod.  The
>ankylosaurIANs that are found with iguanodontids are, for the most part,
>nodosaurids and "polacanthids" (and whatever the hell Minmi is!?!), none of
>which have the elaborate tail-clubs of the Ankylosauridae.
>
>So, if the ankylosaurids were mimicing anything, it probably wasn't Iguanodon.
>
>I still haven't seen the Thulborn paper, so maybe there are arguments that
>haven't been posted favoing this idea.  However, I have no problem with
>anklyosaurid tail-clubs as defensive weapons, protecting the back the way
>stegosaurian "thagomizers" were probably used.

Not to mention the closest mammalian analogue to ankylosaurs, the
glyptodonts, some of which had very nice tail clubs, thank you.  Of course
we don't know what they did with them as they had the discourtesy to die out
before the invention of ethology.....
--
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