Re: Bill Adlam RE: mass, momentum, & misc.

["Alaric Shapli" <ashapli@erols.com>]

> 
> An excellent and interesting point.  However, would you apply similar
> reasoning to spiked ankylosaur armor, club tails, spike tails, etc. (that
> being that incipient armor, spikes, and clubs would have been of no use
> against a predator)? 

Assuming for the moment that ankylosaurs and stegosaurs did in fact use
there tail clubs and / or spikes as weapons (seems to me I've seen
suggestions for other uses on this very list...), I would like to point out
that there are creatures who use their unaddorned tails as weapons.  It
seems to me that for a tail-swinging animal to develope some additional
structure on the tail to increase the amount of damage caused (or even to
make the tail look more threatening to a potential target) would make a lot
of scence.  This assumes that the unaddorned tail was allready an effective
weapon; the addornment would merely increase the effectiveness.