Raptor Claws(formerly Triceratops Frills)

[GROSS CORY WALTER <GROS4891@ADC.MTROYAL.AB.CA>]

Date sent:      Tue, 23 Jan 1996 13:06:16 -0500
From:           martin@hpentccl.grenoble.hp.com (veni, vidi, concreti)
Subject:        Triceratops Frills
To:             Multiple recipients of list <dinosaur@lepomis.psych.upenn.edu>
Send reply to:  martin@hpentccl.grenoble.hp.com
>
>Also, again, could the large "kicking" claw on (I can't remember the 
>name but it begins with a D) be used for climbing on the backs of 
>larger prey to get at the neck, rather than for disembowelling?  
>Could one imagine predators which specialise in one type of prey, 
>using one successfull killing technique (until the prey developed a 
>counter-measure), rather than preying on all species?
>
>martin 
>
    Howdy,
        Deinonychus(and Dromaeosaurids in general [I *hate* the term 
"Raptor" to describe the family!!]) "kicking" claws were probably 
used most often for attack. That appears to be the most suitable 
reason for having them; and from what little I do know about claw 
structure, a Dromaeosaurid claw does not look like it is built for 
grasping/climbing. A more hypothetical disproof is that if it would 
adapt one claw for such a use, why not adapt the others on the foot 
to do so as well. The one claw is effective for slashing at prey, but 
for climbing, the more the better.
        
        I think that it's wholly reasonable to assume that some 
animals, especially Dromaeosaurids, limited themselves to attacking 
certain types of animals (with the occasional rodent hordeurve? mixed 
in). I'm toying with this idea right now that I suppose I may publish 
sometime; and the basic gist of it is that Dromaeosaurs were so well 
adapted to hunting certain prey that if something happened to the 
food, then our fair dino's were dead in the water (it's a bit of an 
expansion on punc. eq.). If you look at the record, it seems that 
Droms. suffered a horrid rate of extinction for an animal that was 
such an apparently good hunter; so it seems that if...say a new 
hunter took their prey animals away, or they hunted their own prey 
into extinction(my...how P.C. ;-)), they couldn't really hunt 
anything else. It's a little oversimplified, but it ain't the whole 
hypo. either.

Later
Cory Gross
artist,writer,philosopher,scientist
gros4891@adc.mtroyal.ab.ca

                     "Sanity, you're a madman!!"-The Tick