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

[John Hunt <john.bass@ntlworld.com>]

Except no elephant has a trunk three times longer than it needs to reach
the ground!

> 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 unpublished) reasons, I do not otherwise find it unreasonable that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.
>