Re: And the T. Rex bell goes "dung"!

["Thomas R. Holtz, Jr." <th81@umail.umd.edu>]

At 07:34 PM 6/18/98 +0100, Gautam Majumdar wrote:

>The specimen (2.4 litre by volume) contains a high proportion of bone
>fragments (30-50%).  Macroscopic fragments range in size from 2 - 34 mm in
>length. The ground mass also contains sand grain sized bone cast. The
>bones were clearly crushed before swallowing. How did T.rex did that with
>only knife like teeth ?

Maybe because T. rex teeth are anything BUT knife-like: they are 0.5-0.7
times (or more) wider across than long in cross-section, the serrations are
offset, and so forth.

On top of all this, tyrannosaurids are the only group of large bodied
theropods known to have a substantial ossified secondary palate, good for a
crushing surface and (as I'll argue at SVP) a nice adaptation for creatures
that fed by torsional motions rather than vertical slicing and slashing.

Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
Vertebrate Paleontologist     Webpage: http://www.geol.umd.edu
Dept. of Geology              Email:th81@umail.umd.edu
University of Maryland        Phone:301-405-4084
College Park, MD  20742       Fax:  301-314-9661