Re: Hadrosaur nesting strategy...(was Re: The Life of Birds

[B.Dol@skn.sc.philips.com]

> Date:          Thu, 29 Jul 1999 09:04:41 -0400 (EDT)
> From:          John Bois <jbois@umd5.umd.edu>
> To:            B.Dol@skn.sc.philips.com
> Cc:            larryf@capital.net, dinosaur@usc.edu
> Subject:       Re: Hadrosaur nesting strategy...(was Re: The Life of Birds

> 
> 
> On Thu, 29 Jul 1999 B.Dol@skn.sc.philips.com wrote:
> 
> > Maybe the surroundings allow for more and better hiding places and 
> > camouflage  making it more difficult for predators to actually find the 
> > prey.
> > Maybe some other listmembers have some ideas about this too. This is, 
> 
> Extant big birds such as ostriches, avoid highly vegetated areas.
> Bertrand's book on Ostrich reprodyction claims this is due to higher
> predator density, and better camouflage for ambush (an ostrich can outrun
> just about anythiong if it knows it's being stalked.  Basically, in my
> view, a goose's body plan is very unsuitable for laying in dense treed
> areas. They must depend on not being found.  I really can't imagine a
> colony of geese nesting in a dense forest.  And I am sure no such thing
> exists (since Ron didn't bite on my last claim, I'm getting a bit bolder,
> you see).
> 
In this instance I was refering to birds in general and not geese. A 
lot of other, smaller, birds migrate too. I can't imagine geese 
nesting in acacia's either.