Re: dino dental hygiene

[Jura <pristichampsus@yahoo.com>]

I don't know of any fish that would be so daring, but
there are birds that readily enter crocodile mouths to
clean out the leftovers. _Pluvianus
aegyptius_(Egyptian Plover) is the little bird in
question. Surprisingly, despite stories dating back to
Heterodotus and numerous anecdotes (both professional
and non), the act in question has yet to be officially
documented. 

At least, that's what Wikipedia says. 

A quick Google search did pull up one picture:

http://www.oknation.net/blog/home/blog_data/976/7976/images/Crocodile_bird.jpg

The pic might be fake, or the croc might be dead
(though I don't know why the jaws would be open then).


Still, I see no reason to doubt that such a thing
could happen. This behaviour is already well
documented in sharks. It's also seen in Galapagos
tortoises (_Geochelone nigra_), who adopt a cleaning
posture. 

The obvious follow-up question to something like this
is how would such a trait evolve? What suicidal little
animal would decide to give such a thing a shot in the
first place? 

Maybe bacterial "mind-control" is responsible.

Jason 



--- hammeris1@bellsouth.net wrote:

> > You won't find many fish cleaning a crocs mouth,
> they would become  
> > lunch.
> 
> > 
> 
> So there are no very small/foul-tasting little
> fishes
> that a croc might be genetically inclined to
> tolerate
> for such activity?
>  
> 


"I am impressed by the fact that we know less about many modern [reptile] types 
than we do of many fossil groups." - Alfred S. Romer


      
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