Re: Jurassic Park

[Scott A Hartman <ottscay@uwyo.edu>]

>>>AND YET... If we knew of elephants from fossil evidence only, and found
impressions indicating "wooliness" on mammoths, we would doubtless assume
that "modern" elephants (and rhinos for that matter) had "wool" too and
would restore them that way.  Which would be wrong.  So you may claim that
you "should" draw dromaeosaurids with feathers because creatures far more
distantly related to them than the elephants I mention are to each other,
had them.  So you "could" be wrong if you did.   <<<

Except that it's well known (see ALexander's 1986 book) that once you
achieve a large enough mass, your surface area/volume ratio becomes
favorable enough to insulate an animal from a tropical environment.  That
size is WELL above velociraptor size (or deinonychus).  Does anyone (I'm
sure Mr. Olshevsky does) have the 1996 Continental Jurassic volume?
There's a paper in there by Gierlinski documenting an Early Jurassic
resting imprint from an animal a little bigger than lilliensternus (~150
kg for the resting animal).  And there are pretty clear impressions of
large, sinosauropteryx-like protofeathers where the belly lay.  This
animals was an order of magnitude larger than velociraptor.  It
also preceeded it (and compsognathids) by a loonnnnnggggg time.  Suggests
to me that insulation was pretty wide spread amoungst the theropods.

Scott Hartman