Re: Dino that hopped like a Kangaroo?

["Jaime A. Headden" <qilongia@yahoo.com>]

Art Sippo (ArtSippo@aol.com) wrote:

<I recall reading that there was a theropod that it was speculated could
have hopped in a manner similar to that of the kangaroo.  Does anyone know
which dinosaur that would be?>

  This would have been the oft-suggested rabbit crocs, which some regard
as basal theropods. They are not actually dinosaurs. *Lagosuchus* (a nomen
dubium based on a non-diagnostic hindlimb), *Marasuchus*, and *Lagerpeton*
have extremely long hindlegs with long propodia, and a calcaneum with a
posterolateral tuber. This tuber would have increased the moment of the
propodial extension, and would have enabled the animal to "hop." Birds
have a similar process on their tarsometatarsi that would have done pretty
much the same thing. This is how those little archosaurs got the name
"lago-" or "mara-" attached to their names, little hopping reptiles.
Incidentally, kangaroos don't hop, they "ricochet" (Muybridge, 1903).

  Cheers,

=====
Jaime A. Headden

  Little steps are often the hardest to take.  We are too used to making leaps 
in the face of adversity, that a simple skip is so hard to do.  We should all 
learn to walk soft, walk small, see the world around us rather than zoom by it.

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