Re: Gallery and Commentary for Copenhagen Mamenchisaurus - apologies to Mike

[Amtoine Grant <ajgrant@eastlink.ca>]

HEY! You just ma de me realize that we sort of DO have an 
'extant'(never used that term before) creature exhibiting great[er than 
need necessarily be] size that grazes on the ground AND the trees. 
Elephants! THEY just developed long trunks to do the job INSTEAD of 
lengthening the neck to do so. As for the short tail, when you pretty 
have a much have a box shaped body without a head held out to 
off-balance you, you wouldn't NEED a long one. As matter of fact, no 
large mammals have what you'd call thick tails for their body size, 
except the smaller, more specialized ones. Not even giraffe's, which 
are the longest necked living reps - anybody know about their 
ancestors? Of course, as we all know, their necks evolved vertically, 
which again, doesn't 'off-balance' you like a horizontal, held out one.

> Actually, DOES Cetiosaurus have a neck terribly longer than was 
> necessary to reach the ground?  Niether Shunosaurus or 
> Haplocanthosaurus, nor for that matter, Camarasaurus, seem to have 
> necks greatly in excess of the length it takes to reach the ground, 
> they just are fairly tall animals, so require long necks.  While I 
> maintain that Camarasaurus was not a grazer for other (and currently 
> unpublished) reasons, I do not otherwise find it unreasonable that 
> Camrasaurus spent more time grazing than diplodocids did.