Re: dinosaur digestion

["T. Mike Keesey" <tmk@dinosauricon.com>]

On Wed, 14 Nov 2001 Buckaroobwana@aol.com wrote:

> Greetings,
> I was reading The Scientific American Book of Dinosaurs yesterday,
> particularly the illustration demonstrating the size difference between an
> Argentinosaurus baby and an adult. The caption points out that full adult
> size was achieved in only a few decades. I also recall reading about how some
> researchers are puzzled over the ability of the environment to support such
> large plant eaters(especially if they were warm blooded). Could it be
> possible that dinosaurs were able to digest their food more efficently than
> mammals?

Not a bad idea, as far as I can tell. One talk at SVP (sorry, don't recall
details offhand) suggested that perhaps one reason they could grow so fast
is that they were, in a sense "hollow", thanks to air sacs in the thorax.
Thus they were not as massive as they might appear. (Although still pretty
massive, of course!!)

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