Re: The smallest elephants (was: The biggest dinosaurs)

[Andrea Spreafico <sprea@linknet.it>]

At 14.56 01/09/97 ARG, you wrote:

>P.S.: It looks funny to me (funny peculiar, I mean) that Struthiosaurus,
which supposedly 
>evolved in a predator-free environment, has retained its body armour and
spikes.
>Can anybody ellaborate on this? Thanks
>

Dwarf ankylosaur _Struthiosaurus_ may have retained its body armour and
spikes simply because its ancestor had them. If a structure loses its
usefulness, this doesn't mean that surely, sooner or later, it will
disappear. But it's also possible that new advantages did come from a
structure, originally useful in another way.

Eugenio Spreafico