Re: Biggest predators

["Patrick Norton" <ptnorton@email.msn.com>]

Tom Holtz said:

>_Deinocheirus_ is not much like these at all.  It's claws have a very low
angle of curvature, they are VERY broad in cross-section, they do not show
the typical theropod (indeed, basal dinosaurian) deflection of manual digit
I.  Instead, they have the same  metacarpal proportions and shapes as
ornithomimosaurs.<

Is there any evidence that claws do not change allometrically (different
shapes at different sizes) as do theropod teeth--particularly tyrannosaurid
teeth?

>Whatever _Deinocheirus_ was doing, it was doing it much more like an
ornithomimosaur than like allosaurs or dromaeosaurs. <

And what precisely were ornithomimosaurs doing with those claws anyway?

PTNorton@msn.com
www.geocities.com/capecanaveral/galaxy/1962/