Re: Suchomimus tenerensis

["John V Jackson" <jjackson@interalpha.co.uk>]

--Original Message--From: tlford@ix.netcom. 23 November 1998 08:21



>Jaime A. Headden wrote:
>
>>
>>   However, I caution you, Caleb, on dismissing the piscivore
>> hyposthesis on basis of size, whereas the skull seems supremely
>> adapted for fish. It would appear to me, immediately, that a
>> multiple-animal diet, one of the dry season and one of the wet season
>> in a temperate clime and time where it would not conceivably snow (am
>> I wrong, anyone?), would seem the most parsimonious explanation for
>> all the parts.
>>
>
>One of the problems that I have for it being a piscivore is sure,
>looking at the skull from either top or bottom its thin, like a ghavial,
>but from the side it higer. Piscivore's need a long thin skull so they
>can swip the skull throu the water to catch fish.
>
>Now I don't know how a high skull would work hydrodynamically under
>water, but I think a higher thin skull would be a hinderance.
>


Crocodilians hunt with their heads underwater, and make the 'snatch' by
moving the head sideways.  More terrestrial types will look down into the
water from above; their strikes will usually have a very small sideways
component.  Maybe pterosaurs provide a better model for comparison.


John V Jackson    jjackson@interalpha.co.uk

"So many professors . . . so little time . . ."