Re: When carnivores kill other carnivores... (Morrison movie questions)

[Patrick Norton <ptnorton@suscom-maine.net>]

Sean Craven wrote:

> The scene I have in mind involves the aftermath of a mass slaughter of 
> Seismosaurs. (People are after the gastroliths. I'll have more questions 
> on this subject.)

Killing a Seismosaurs to harvest its gastroliths is very much akin to 
killing the goose that laid the golden egg.  Why would you do it?  In living 
animals, gastroliths are regularly regurgitated when they become too highly 
polished to serve efficiently as grinders, and new rocks are swallowed to 
take their place.  Over the course of its life, a Seismosaur would discharge 
many times more nice smooth gastroliths than one would ever get from a 
one-time harvest (assuming they even had gastroliths). Not only would it 
more productive to keep the Seismosaur alive and continually "harvest" its 
shed gastroliths by walking around and picking them up, it would be far less 
dangerous for the humans than attacking and killing the animal. Without a 
good reason for having to kill the animal for its gastroliths, this aspect 
of the story doesn't make a lot of sense.

PTN