Re: Stegosaur plates

[Stan Friesen <swf@ElSegundoCA.ATTGIS.COM>]

From: Kjetil =?iso-8859-1?Q?=C5kra?= <Kjetil.Akra@zmb.uib.no>
 > My main reference was Stephen A. Czerkas'm article in "Dinosaurs past and
 > Present, Vol II" (1987) called " A reevaluation of the plate arrangement on
 > Stegosaurus stenops".
 > 
 > To quote him: ...
 > . Still, I guess is interpretation
 > was not generally accepted.

Not any more.  At the time it seemed good.
The reality - *alternating* plates in two rows - is extremely unusual
in vertebrates.  It took a good specimen to eliminate his ideas.
 > 
 > I have now completed my Stegosaur (with one row of plates) and all that
 > remains is the color of the beast. The color can never be known of cource,
 > but I have heard of an article stating that large dinosaurs couldn't be
 > anything but grey (just like elephants and rhinos).

For the *really* large ones, this is likely.

But I do not think that Stegosaurus was quite that large.

Its habitat was a seasonally dry "savanna", with ferns as ground
cover and scattered small trees and bushes, and gallery forests
along watercourses.

Large animals in this habitat would tend to be rather "drab", but
not necessarily gray.  A russet brown (like dry ferns) is a good
possibility, as is a sort of olive drab.  If it spent more time
in the gallery forest than on the open savanna, it may have been
subtly striped (say olive and black).  Of course gray or blue-gray
is also rather likely (or steel-gray).

[Compare: lions which are camoflouged with dry grass - which is
yellow; the blue-gray of water buffalo; the browns of many of the
larger antelope, such as the roan antelope, and the dark brown
of the male sable antelope].

swf@elsegundoca.attgis.com              sarima@netcom.com

The peace of God be with you.