Re: Warm-Blooded debate

[Jeffrey Martz <martz@holly.ColoState.EDU>]

> Komodo Lizards (_Varanus komodoensis_)  get by without starving due to a
> wide variety of factors...one of which is a lack of competing top
> predators.
 
     The same would have been true of theropods, ectotherms or endotherms.
 
> Physiology, too, is important...they don't
> need to eat as much as a 150-200 pound endotherm.  Their lifestyle is
> that of a hide and ambush predator, like crocodiles without the water; if
> the chosen prey item isn't killed immediately, they have been known to
> track the bleeding wounds for long  (I can't remember how long)
> distances, as well.  They are also not adverse to eating carrion.

      All of which may have been true of theropods.  Particulary notable
to me is the tracking for "long distances"; didn't someone that becasue
some dinosaurs definitely migrated (soemthing I find a little
questionable; wide distribution of a species does not mean they migrated)
it means they couldn't have been ectotherms, because ectotherms couldn't
keep moving for longer then a very brief time?  
  
> As a model for dinosaur predation and therefore success,  Komodo dragons
> are poor. 
  
      I am not so sure about that.

LN Jeff
O-