Re: Dinosaur Questions, Relating Vaguely to Dinosaur Park Formation

["Grant Harding" <granth@cyberus.ca>]

Thomas R. Holtz, Jr., wrote:
>Ornithomimosaurs and caenagnathids are more problematic: omnivore might
>represent the best concensus.

If meat was in fact part of their diet, what would be the size range for
their prey?

>>Erlikosaurus andrewsi
>
>Not really applicable in this case: the cf. _Erlikosaurus_ material simply
>looks like it: it has yet to be demonstrated it's even therizinosauroid.
>The specimen in question (a frontal) is about the size of the same bone in
>big Dinosaur Park Fm. _Troodon_ specimens, so IF you want it to be a
>therizinosauroid, then you could take your _Troodon_ mass estimate and
>multiply by 1.5 to 2 (therizinosauroids are fat relative to troodontids).
>Or, you could recognize that estimating masses from isolated frontals might
>not be that good an idea... :-)

Okay.  Thanks.  But what about the actual, known, Mongolian _E. andrewsi_?
Know of a suggested mass for that guy?

>>Paronychodon lacustris
>
>Well, the teeth mass only a couple of grams, and that's all that's known...
>(use estimates for _Dromaeosaurus_ and you won't be too far off).

Thank you.  Will do.


-Grant

--
Grant Harding
High school student/closet paleontologist
granth@cyberus.ca
Visit Grant Harding's Dinosaur Destination at
http://www.cyberus.ca/~sharding/grant/
"...I suspect he actually has a subspecies of _Stenonychosaurus_, though I
haven't decided for sure...small Triassic carnivore--two meters from pes to
acetabulum. In point of fact, a rather ordinary theropod..." -from
Crichton's _The Lost World_