Re: Spinosaurids, the Orca's on land?

["Marilyn Wegweiser" <mdwegweiser@hotmail.com>]

> From: Daniel Bensen <dbensen@gotnet.net>
> Reply-To: dbensen@gotnet.net
> To: dino.hunter@home.com
> CC: Dinonet <dinosaur@usc.edu>
> Subject: Re: Spinosaurids, the Orca's on land?
> Date: Sat, 01 Sep 2001 09:05:51 -0700
>
> >>Spinosaurids have conical teeth, larger than Killer Whales, they to
> could rip up their meal (had to at some point, at least
> it?s larger meals). The teeth are more tightly packed and the largest
> teeth are at the front of the jaw as oppose to toward
> the middle in other theropods. Some thing to look into? Perhaps they
> ripped holes into sauropods?<<
>
> The shape of orca and spinosaur skulls are pretty different.  I'd expect
> orca jaws to be much more resistant to side-to-side stress than would
> the jaws of spinosaurs.

I'm rather fond of that mental image I have of the orca appearing on the 
beqch in Patagonia (been there, done that) and flipping a now rather hapless 
young seal end over end in the air. It goes well with the mental of the 
around 60 of them, that appeared in McMurdo harbor after we broke ice going 
in (Antarctica) - and the way they emerge through sea ice - dangerous to 
simply take a stroll across Atnarctice sea ice that an Orca can see through. 
They simply burst upward.

The mental of any of our beloved dinosaurs that could swim and hunt doing 
the same isn't too hard for me to do.

Cheers,
Marily

=00=  =00=  =00=  =00=
Marilyn D. Wegweiser, Ph.D.
CMC Research Associate
Adjunct Curator of Vertebrate Paleontology
Cincinnati Museum Center
Geier Collections and Research Center



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