Re: Hadrosaur beaks and tails

["Justin Tweet" <thescelosaurus@juno.com>]

The LACM specimen was described by William Morris in 1970: 

Morris, W.J. (1970). Hadrosaurian dinosaur bills - morphology and function. 
Contributions in Science of the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History 
193:1-14.

I've seen this reference, but I don't have a pdf.  Morris interpreted the beak 
as having been used to strain plants and small aquatic invertebrates from 
water.  Paul Barrett briefly discussed and rejected this hypothesis in his 
discussion of ornithomimosaur diets (ornithomimosaurs were briefly thought to 
have done the same thing with their beaks).

Barrett, P.M. (2005). The diet of ostrich dinosaurs (Theropoda: 
Ornithomimosauria). Palaeontology 48(2):347-358.

-Justin



---------- Original Message ----------
From: quailspg@frii.com
To: dinosaur@usc.edu
Subject: Re: Hadrosaur beaks and tails
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 2009 15:04:34 -0600

Shere Khan junior wrote:

> I was wondering what the beaks of hadrosaurs were
> like when the animals were alive. I understand
> they were made of keratin, but what was the
> covering like?

The Los Angeles County Museum has a flippin' FANTASTIC Edmontosaurus skull
with some of the keratin shape preserved. Have they EVER published
pictures of it??? When I was there some years ago it was displayed in a
dark corner which made picture taking difficult. Are there any good images
available on the web or in books... or are they still keeping it a secret
(for some unfathomable reason)?

-- Donna Braginetz