Re: Size matters. The social life of big dinosaurs.

[Dann Pigdon <dannj@alphalink.com.au>]

On Tue, 18 Apr 2006 19:08:56 -0500, Dora Smith wrote
> Oh, yup.  I saw that.  On google news or something.
> 
> It seems that the very largest meat eating dinosaurs lived and 
> hunted in groups?
> 
> I wonder how on earth they found enough to eat!

If they were anything like modern endothermic carnivores, they probably spent 
a lot of time just lying about conserving energy. If they were more like 
ectotherms, then even more so.

Also, an adult sauropod (whether hunted or scavenged) would go a long way. 
Has anyone attempted to calculate the available soft tissue mass of an adult 
sauropod (pick a relevant contemporaneous species), and assuming the likely 
metabolic requirements of a predator, determined how long a single animal 
would feed any single adult mega-theropod? 

I suspect a single carcass would last quite a while, even for a group of 
predators. Where tyrannosaurs are concerned, you'd have to include the 
crunchier parts of the prey as well (since the blade-like teeth of 
carcharodontosaurs would seem to restrict them to muscle and viscera).

--
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Dann Pigdon
GIS / Archaeologist         http://heretichides.soffiles.com
Melbourne, Australia        http://www.geocities.com/dannsdinosaurs
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