paleontology

[bright veldt]

I’m just saying that if tyrannosaurs had a specific method of processing triceratops carcasses, then they fed on them frequently enough to warrant such a process forming, rather than the assumption that triceratops were extremely dangerous to even attempt and were usually avoided.

[sullen cairn]

I can’t wait to successfully find a good triceratops weight estimate

[white matrix]

That's fair but as I said before the Triceratops would not have been its first choice.

[astral kelp]

Isnt there already multiple gdis for it?

[bright veldt]

True. I really wish we understood their range of diet like with tarbosaurus.

[white matrix]

That isn't to say the Rex didn't feed frequently enough. Because even doing so a few times a year would be enough for it to develop such a method.
Like I said it was an equally dangerous thing for both of them to do but that's the same for most predators and prey today

[covert lintel]

i feel like it's worth noting that the whole frill situation does make it trickier to get to the neck, apparently both in life and in death.
in death there's the good ol' decapitation method, but i do wonder what kind of strategies would've been employed to get around that while the trike was still alive.

[sullen cairn]

I meant for big John and co.

[ancient crystal]

Man all these points would've been useful half an hour ago when I was talking with some people trying to say T. rex was an inefficient hunter of literally all its prey items

[white matrix]

I believe it's possible the Triceratops could move its neck back possibly slightly but that's just brainstorming

[white matrix]

Everything we've said has shown the Rex has been a very effective hunter.

[astral kelp]

Found a new theropod phylogeny (by. Torvosaurus)

[ancient crystal]

I know, thats why I wish this convo happened half an hour ago

[little mauve]

They were the two most common large animals in the environment & the extreme anatomy of both is almost certainly a result of their interaction. It's called an evolutionary arms race.

[bright veldt]

Predators are predators to their prey species for a reason. They have to make hundreds of kills throughout their lives in order to survive. I believe the only case known in nature of predators frequently dying to their prey is lions vs African buffalo, and even then it is a very complex relationship that isn’t universal throughout both species.

[white matrix]

I love the Tyrannosaurus Rex but it wasn't some untouchable beast.

[compact leaf]

there is a lot more than just lions and buffalo but the point stands, they have to make a lot of kills and prey need to get away a lot it’s not as cut and dry as it usually seems

[astral kelp]

Tbf this happens with tigers and Indian gaurs as well, it’s just not recorded often

[little mauve]

I think it comes down to the success of the ambush, which is key for many predators

[bright veldt]

Eh not exactly. Keep in mind im saying predators frequently dying to said prey. There are a handful of prey animals that pose a threat and do fend off said predators, but said predators having a statistically high chance of death in said encounters is extremely rare.

[regal schooner]

That's why crocodiles can be a viable life form

[sullen cairn]

apex predator's in general tend to hunt big dangerous things

[regal schooner]

They always resort to ambushing them tho cause it's almost impossible to beat them in a head to head fight for example leapords and silver backs

[compact leaf]

it also depends on the predator hunting them but it’s decently common in some cases, with large herbivores the chance of the predator dying is much higher

[bright veldt]

Most predators do not have high success rates but it’s because they fail in a wide variety of circumstances that don’t involve them dying lol.

[sullen cairn]

and hunting success rates are extremely volatile from any number of factors

[little mauve]

I don't think dying in these interactions was remotely common for the rex. I think if an ambush failed there would probably be a standoff followed by a strategic retreat

[regal schooner]

A trike was faster than a rex, and they're said to be very aggressive along with almost every herbivore

[astral kelp]

Dragonflies with their 95% hunting success rate:

[compact leaf]

dragonflies are insane

[sullen cairn]

tyrannosaurus - the mesozoic dragonfly

[bright veldt]

Saying all of this, triceratops likely was aggressive in order to fend itself. It had the size to properly pose a threat while also being too slow to reliably run away. I just think in such situations where the rex clearly didn’t succeed that there would be little in the way of contact and injury and just giving up instead of death lol.

[astral kelp]

African wild dogs have a high hunting success rate too afaik even more than hyenas

[bright veldt]

Ceratopsids in general likely relied on numbers and fleeing akin to hadrosaurs, but triceratopsines had a common and more practical setup to their horns which, combined with their larger size, means that they likely had a defensive purpose.

[sullen cairn]

especially since triceratops was likely less social and herded less than other ceratopsions

[regal schooner]

Triceratops is faster than a rex, it could run above 18 MPH while the Rex's speed is at 18 MPH cause it could only move at a fast walk

[white matrix]

Wasn't it 13?

[bright veldt]

I highly doubt that. Every model I’ve seen has had tyrannosaurus as the fastest large animal in its environment. Edmontosaurus is the only competition I’ve seen in terms of speed/endurance.

[little mauve]

Triceratops was slower than rex, though by how much I think is dependent on if it's truly graviportal or not

[tough parcel]

T. rex is the fastest multi-ton animal in its environment, I don't see Trike running down a rex, stamina or speed-wise

[compact leaf]

african wild dogs have such a high rate partially because of their hunting style, but it’s also because they tend to stay well within their prey comfort zone, still really impressive but they do less well with new things

[regal schooner]

A trike is believed to run at a max speed of 20 MPH

[little mauve]

As stated above, Triceratops probably didn't need speed to defend itself. Simply exposing its horns to an attacker would be enough

[bright veldt]

African wild dogs have very high hunt success rates but also tend to fare more poorly in competitive interactions, especially against lions.

[tough parcel]

Source please because there's no good Triceratops estimates

Everything is bad and outdated, but just by common sense that the quadrupedal, graviportal animal is slower than the bipedal, speed McGee

[sullen cairn]

lions are also like 10x their size

[regal schooner]

If a trike manages to face a rex the Rex's best option is to run cause I don't see how it can get through the trikes frill

[compact leaf]

yeah that ones probably the worst matchup for them, sometimes vultures manage it too but get enough vultures and they’ll drive off anything

[bright veldt]

Regardless

[little mauve]

I agree, it would be a failed ambush at that point

[astral kelp]

I wonder why do big cats usually have low success rates when it comes to hunting?

[tough parcel]

Fun fact: We have evidence of Tyrannosaurus 1v1ing and face-tanking Triceratops, not just taking them from behind, but actually slamming their face into the face of a Triceratops

[sullen cairn]

because a failed hunts include ambushes that failed before they even began

[bright veldt]

It’s less big cats having poor success rates and more that it’s kinda the norm. Hyenas and wild dogs aren’t exactly normal in that regard. Gray wolves have much lower success rates than they do and they have a similar hunting strategy. It’s all on the context.

[little mauve]

Is that the horn pathology specimen?

[regal schooner]

Jaguars and Tigers have an above average or average success rate but lions have a low success rate cause they hunt oryx which are faster than them and can escape from they're ambush and they also hunt buffalo's which destroy them

[tough parcel]

There's a couple of them

[compact leaf]

context really is everything with interactions like these

[sullen cairn]

hunting success ratios generally have lots of circumstantial variation

[bright veldt]

Lions hunting buffalo isn’t actually as common as people think it is. Buffalo hunting is usually relegated to prides who dedicate to that strategy exclusively and have learned said strategy over many years and generations. More typical lion prides that hunt a wider variety of antelope and other ungulates typically avoid buffalo entirely, and when they do attempt it it usually goes poorly.

[compact leaf]

in conversations like these sables get left out a lot but they have a lot of hunts against them end in failure and death, it’s a unique circumstance that doesn’t have much bearing here I just wanted to throw it out because it’s cool

[little mauve]

Oh I only knew about the one. Rex was truly insane. It was operating with a much much larger brain than Triceratops too, maybe it could effectively attack head on as well. Calling a bluff or something. We really have no idea what eithers temperaments were like. Triceratops could have been a bluffer more than a fighter, it wouldn't be that unusual.

[regal schooner]

This damn slowmode omg

[astral kelp]

Another question, usually I know a single male lions can scare off 20-30 hyenas, but why is that, are hyenas really that afraid of just 1 lion in its prime compared to like 30 of them?

[sullen cairn]

because one lion can easily cripple or kill any one of them very quickly

[white matrix]

You're saying if you were 6'3 about to fight 10 5 year olds you couldn't take em?

[regal schooner]

Sometimes 20 hyenas can kill a male lion

[astral kelp]

The size difference isn’t that drastic

[regal schooner]

It's more like ur 6,3 abt to fight 5,3 5 14 year olds

[white matrix]

Could still take em.

[nocturne gazelle]

One swipe from a lion can put a hyena out of commission. Much more scary when you don't have respawn. They could yolo and kill the lion ofc, but one may die. And when none want to die, that can scare all of them off.

[sullen cairn]

same reason herds don't all just fight predators

[bright veldt]

That’s not quite true, and is another thing that typically isn’t well understood about lion vs hyena interactions. Hyenas are likely a key component as to why lions became social in the first place, in order to properly be able to compete in competitive interactions. Lionesses are larger than hyenas but hyenas are able to subsist in higher numbers in groups, so lion prides and hyena prides tend to be neck and neck in most interactions and victories are usually based on individual circumstances. Male lions turn the tables however. Being twice the size of females, they have the power to kill hyenas reliably and are often the leading cause of death for hyenas. Male lions are not invincible, and a large clan can still threaten them, but the male lion’s much larger size means they are substantially more dangerous than lionesses are.

[stiff osprey]

Yeah, animal pack behavior is almost always regulated on each individual thinking "hmm, that thing might kill me, i won't mess with it" instead of "if we all work together, we'll eventually kill it"

[white matrix]

If they had the 2nd mentality they would be destructive

[nocturne gazelle]

Can't heal by sitting for 2 minutes irl.

[bright veldt]

People often look down on hyenas in such situations but said people also don’t know that hyenas are likely what caused lions to be social in the first place, and during the ice age hyenas straight up dominated cave lions in competitive interactions.

[stiff osprey]

The only thing that could stop migratory 1 million+ wildebeest herds if they thought the latter would be nukes, lmao

[astral kelp]

I think the hyena stereotypes came from the lion king tbh

[white matrix]

I love this chat. This is glorious.

[sullen cairn]

look at paleo chat not being dead for once

[stiff osprey]

and it's because it's modern talk 😔

[bright veldt]

Lmao I made it paleo just now don’t worry about it don’t tell

[regal schooner]

And it's not being used for paleo talk and instead modern animals zoo/paleo chat💪

[compact leaf]

at least it’s not a debate about spinosaurus

[white matrix]

We're actually having a genuine healthy discussion based of of facts and not opinions. Unlike some groups that shall not be named

[astral kelp]

Do you think something like the tsavo lions might happen again?

[sullen cairn]

actually come to think of it how'd we end up on extant predator interactions when tyrannosaurus is 20x the size of the next biggest predator in hell creek

[nocturne gazelle]

Tsavo lions?

[regal schooner]

Do yall think a parasaurolophus can defeat an adult spinosaurus?

[bright veldt]

Exactly how true the tsavo lion situation is is up to debate. Unfortunately most man eaters at that time are a result of human encroachment pushing said animals to desperation for various reasons.

[white matrix]

.....no
That's like comparing a child to an aduly

[regal schooner]

What do u think the spino will do against the para?

[astral kelp]

Wdym by the how true part? As in like they might have not been man eaters?

[stiff osprey]

the very largest Parasaurolophus could probably bowl over a Spino and escape

[nocturne gazelle]

Does someone have an up to date para size charg? I heard they got pretty big.

[white matrix]

Is it on water or land? If it's on land then the parasaurolophus can get away but if it's in the water the para is getting it's throat ripped out.

[sullen cairn]

fadeno had the largest at ~12.5t

[bright veldt]

It’s unclear as to whether the tsavo lions were truly the same pair attacking again and again or if it was multiple different instances that only looked to be from the same individuals out of assumption. Isotopic studies in particular suggested the two individuals shot and killed mostly ate the nearby ungulates rather than people.

[regal schooner]

A parasaurolophus could destroy a spinos legs considering they're small and a para uses its whole body for offense

[nocturne gazelle]

Chunky, thanks

[covert lintel]

why

[sullen cairn]

big lads

[bright veldt]

I don’t see either killing each other realistically. There’s nothing really stopping the para using it’s sheer mass to shake off whatever the spino tries and run away.

[stiff osprey]

more fair of a fight than I expected tbh

[pearl briar]

Conclusion: Trike and Anky can beat Rex and vice versa

[covert lintel]

my main two questions in a vs scenario are always:
1: why (read: does this discussion actually achieve anything useful)
2 (if it's spinosaurus): are we sure it'd take that fight in the first place instead of just eating a fish

[astral kelp]

Interesting, ever heard of machli the one tigress who preferred to hunt mugger crocs, would there be any reason why a tigress would prefer to hunt crocs rather than ungulates?

[regal schooner]

The para can just crush it, this fight would play out as t rex vs edmnoto the only difference being is that it's close to impossible for a para to lose

[bright veldt]

Spinosaurids we’re specialized for fish but we have multiple instances of them being opportunistic as well. Shoutout to Suchomimus for being so massive in its ecosystem that there’s little that it wouldn’t have been able to catch and kill if it wanted to.

[pearl briar]

no 6 ft tall human for comparison
me no like it 😤

[stiff osprey]

Bro thinks Parasaurolophus is made of lead

[sullen cairn]

I don't think spinosaurus and tyrannosaurus would hunt large hadrosaurus the same way especially when the former didn't live with any

[bright veldt]

We don’t have a good record of herbivorous dinosaurs in spino’s ecosystem. Most you’ll get is a few sauropod species and fragmentary unnamed ornithischians.

[regal schooner]

Yea they were adapted for fish but people tend to forget that and make them look like killing machines

[astral kelp]

(If anyone knows that be nice)

[bright veldt]

Forgot about the weirdo probably-herbivorous Deltadromeus as well.

[sullen cairn]

maybe someone in the crocodilian server knows?

[pearl briar]

what spino ecosystem?
Kem Kem or Bahariya?

[regal schooner]

Bro do u think a spinos legs would support its body after being pushed by a 4 ton para?

[stiff osprey]

Machli didn't prefer to hunt muggers, there is one recorded instance of her successfully killing one. I heard she went after it because the area was in an unusually severe drought, and so the croc was vulnerable

[astral kelp]

Ah damn I should stop listening to these rumours

[bright veldt]

If it’s the video I’m thinking of then she by no means came out of that clean. That one fight she had with the large mugger took 12 hours and broke some of her teeth.

[sullen cairn]

either way the large herbivores were probably reserved for the multiton allosauroids and abelisaurid

[nocturne gazelle]

Usually the main reason is entertainment, which isn't "productive" but in a discord for video games, is to be expected.

[stiff osprey]

Dinosaurs don't study kung fu moves, the Para isn't going to throw itself on top of the Spino to break its legs. When attacked it will likely try to keep standing up, as its instinct would be that falling on the ground means both injuring itself and leaving its neck vulnerable. You can see this with most large herbivores irl

[regal schooner]

Elephants are a large herbivore and they charge threats same with hippos and rhinos

[bright veldt]

I was also assuming we were talking about a 10+ ton para. A 3-4 ton para can easily become spino food if it gets grabbed. That’s enough of a size advantage on the spino’s part.

[sullen cairn]

elephants are exponentially larger than their threats than parasaurolophus is to any megatheropod

[nocturne gazelle]

I don't particularly mind X vs Y talks as long as no one takes them seriously and everyone has fun with it.

[covert lintel]

they don't body-slam carnivores as tall as them, though

[stiff osprey]

They don't belly flop on top of threats, either. That's more likely to hurt them than whatever is attacking

[bright veldt]

There were certain hadrosaurs that likely relied on size for defense but they were usually 2-3 times larger than the top predators. Spino is not the one fam.

[fallow citrus]

this chat was so nice before para vs spino conversation

[regal schooner]

Hadrosaurus are said to use they're head, legs, body, weight as offense which means the para will most likely break the spinos legs by charging it

[stiff osprey]

Said by who? No part of a hadrosaur's body is a specialized weapon, at best that is a secondary use

[covert lintel]

by who?

[bright veldt]

Hadrosaurs were usually not defensive animals. From what we know of their ecology they were herding species that relied on numbers and fleeing from danger. Ceratopsids too.

[sullen cairn]

the closest thing a hadrosaur has to an explicit weapon is its tail

[upper solstice]

How do I become a supporter in path of titans

[regal schooner]

They're actually said to be very aggressive

[white matrix]

Support the game.

[bright veldt]

What evidence suggests this?

[sullen cairn]

the closest evidence to aggressive hadrosaurs is tail pathologies that might've been from smacking things while running away

[tough parcel]

No-one says hadrosaurs are aggressive animals other than people going "Oooo but all herbivores are actually killer animals!!!"

[upper solstice]

@white matrix ok I get that I'm just trying to get to the point of how to obtain it ?

[regal schooner]

Harristsang

[astral kelp]

Who is that

[covert lintel]

you're asking in the wrong place, this is the science zone
try #path-of-titans

[bright veldt]

Hadrosaurs had incredibly fast growth rates, reaching sexual maturity within 2-5 years based on the species. You usually see this fast growth and reproduction from prey species that are used to being snacked on very frequently.

[white matrix]

Also they have incredible birth rates

[regal schooner]

Magnapaulia, shantungosaurus and edmontosaurus were definitely getting preyed on very frequently

[stiff osprey]

Edmontosaurus definitely was, idk if we have any growth data for Magnapaulia and Shantungosaurus, so they might not be as focused on fast growth

[ancient crystal]

You're right, edmontosaurus would be a frequent target for predation considering the predator it shared its habitat with

[sullen cairn]

edmontosaurus was definitely getting snacked on a lot

[regal schooner]

An adult edmontosaurus had a chance of defeating a rex, well the chances were on the rexes favor but it still had a 40% chance

[bright veldt]

I’m confused as to what ur trying to say here. In the case of the larger species in particular I’m not suggesting every hadrosaur. There’s room for exceptions. I even said some hadrosaurs likely were defensive given the massive size difference they had over the top predators. And yeah edmonto got snacked on a lot. Individuals larger than trex were rare, and the average edmontosaur was smaller than rex.

[sullen cairn]

An average adult edmontosaurus is like two tons smaller than an average rex

[ancient crystal]

I love these precentages I keep seeing get thrown around

[stiff osprey]

a 14m one sure. but most adult Edmontosaurus were ~11m, and would not stand much of a chance against a rex

[regal schooner]

They were much larger than two tons

[pearl briar]

ah, this guy?

[bright veldt]

Even with the 14m meter individuals I’m not so sure. It’s more dangerous on the Rex’s part, but most top order carnivores are capable of tackling prey larger than they are.

[covert lintel]

average adult edmontosaurus is actually quite small (relatively speaking), the giant ones you're thinking of took a long time to grow to that size - they were very lucky.

[fallow citrus]

two tons smaller, not two tons total

[white matrix]

We can see instances of this with Carcharodontosaurus with sauropods at its time

[sullen cairn]

average edmontosaurus is about ~5.5t

[regal schooner]

Yes, he just reacts to bad documentaries and paleo videos and proves them wrong, but he also uses recently studied articles

[covert lintel]

wait so you're getting it from a youtuber?

[bright veldt]

Welp

[regal schooner]

Yes but as I said they use recently studied sources

[astral kelp]

tbf getting information from YouTuber isn’t bad (IE YDAW) but it usually is bad ig

[pearl briar]

how's largest edmonto to ever estimated?
last time i heard largest edmonto reaching abt 10-ish ton

[sullen cairn]

edmontosaurus is literally smaller than rex bar like 4 specimens

[white matrix]

Getting it from a youtuber isn't bad as long as the YouTuber knows what they are talking about

[stiff osprey]

oh yeah, I'm sure rex would still be tackling the 14m+ individuals. just a lot riskier of a chase than a 11m one

[bright veldt]

If there’s anything to be learned here, it’s that not dealing in absolutes is best lol. Herbivores weren’t fodder but at the same time they have strategies that don’t involve murdering their enemies. Being prey is ok and doesn’t mean their fodder. Impala are frequently depicted as lion and wild dog kibble, but they’re one of the most successful African ungulates of all time. Clearly what they’re doing is working and they don’t care about some people on the internet trying to talk down to them about being food.

[covert lintel]

when your main source for scientific information is "a youtuber said it", though, that aint good. grabbing the source the youtuber used would be better, and if that youtuber isn't providing their sources, they're probably not that reliable

[pearl briar]

@regal schooner what harristsang video that mentioned that hadrosaur is very aggresive and use they're body part as weapon?

[regal schooner]

Well it depends, the youtuber I've gotten like 50% of my paleo knowledge from doesent say random things or outdated things he uses recently studied articles as he once implied in his videos

[astral kelp]

What article has he sourced that says hadrosaurs are aggressive

[white matrix]

Oh I've seen the videos of Gazelles literally frolicking away from Cheetaha lol

[sullen cairn]

Brick’s skeletal is like 15.3t iirc but I’m not sure what it’s be with the new folkes one

[regal schooner]

His said that in almost every video, lemme try and find it

[bright veldt]

Exactly what the largest edmonto’s size is is debated either way.

[white matrix]

Most my knowledge comes from articles and actual studies but I have learnt some things from videos.

[sullen cairn]

Yeah it’s somewhere loosely around the 15t range at the absolute max which again isn’t even close to average size

[pearl briar]

15 is crazy

[bright veldt]

Here’s a very good and scientific video about the reality of herbivore aggression and exactly what goes on in most predator-prey interactions. https://youtu.be/be8QWbQDnXA

[little mauve]

Human culture has a certain bias towards predators, we're predators after all, but at the same time we tend to admire any animal we can describe as big, strong, & dangerous- which extends to many herbivores as well. Look at sports team mascots: you have the Sharks & the Tigers but also the Bulls & the Stallions. It's an interesting phenomenon imo and extends to extinct animals as well

[covert lintel]

📣 do not blindly trust any video, always check if they provide sources and what those sources actually say, yes even if it's YDAW because even generally reliable youtubers are not immune to mistakes

[astral kelp]

I think people see them as kibble because “herbivore don’t use horns to fight back”

[sullen cairn]

here we go

[bright veldt]

Even then a lot of them do. But horns in both ungulates and ceratopsids are primarily for social reasons, and only occasionally used in defensive situations.

[pearl briar]

https://tenor.com/view/what-huh-monkey-shocked-mouth-open-gif-16459002

[regal schooner]

https://youtu.be/lm7-HbyxWVA he only said what part of they're bodies hadrosaurs weaponize

[covert lintel]

concerningly big lad

[pearl briar]

t rex vs edmontosaurus
Winner: both

[regal schooner]

Ive gotten all my permian knowledge from articles and studies but most of my Mesozoic and ceonozoic knowledge is from videos

[astral kelp]

No sources broski

[bright veldt]

Hadrosaurs would’ve used whatever they could to defend themselves like any other animal, but they do not have special adaptations for defense, or anything sharp that could be used in such a way like horns and spikes. The main weapon of hadrosaurs is their size, and most predators don’t care too much about that when the average hadrosaur is 2-3 tons and their predators are larger than that.

[regal schooner]

He doesent put links his just claimed he uses updated articles

[sullen cairn]

eh I think 3-4t's a bit closer to average adult size for the judithian-lancian ones but the point remains

[pearl briar]

what is hadrosaur self defenses?
oh right, they will ran away

[covert lintel]

his source is literally "dude just trust me", then. if there's no sources he's just expecting you to trust what he says

[bright veldt]

The classic social herbivore defense of fleeing and large numbers.

[tough parcel]

We have pathologies on Edmontosaurus tails indicating some use in battle

[regal schooner]

I have a special hatred with this slowmode

[sullen cairn]

and that one that survived getting bit in the face

[pearl briar]

https://tenor.com/view/me-too-me-too-kid-incredibles-gif-19919940

[light osprey]

I wonder how old this fellow was

[bright veldt]

I highly doubt this. What sources? I’ve usually seen them explained as either environmental injuries or the result of various accidents or strain.

[sullen cairn]

https://bioone.org/journals/palaios/volume-35/issue-4/palo.2019.079/SKELETAL-TRAUMA-WITH-IMPLICATIONS-FOR-INTRATAIL-MOBILITY-IN-EDMONTOSAURUS-ANNECTENS/10.2110/palo.2019.079.short

seems like a mix of both

[bright veldt]

Were you being sarcastic and I didn’t pick up on it again?

[tough parcel]

I'm trying to find it, the dodo was meant to be a loading

Nvm, Table found it, I think

[white matrix]

I mean the idea that the tails these dinosaurs had weren't movable is crazy Tyrannosaurus's Rex tail was most likely used for stabilization

[covert lintel]

tbf dinosaurs did generally have relatively stiff tails, especially hadrosaurs and dromaeosaurs if i'm recalling correctly

[little mauve]

Looks like the rate of pathologies is about 1%, I don't know what would be expected but that seems low

[bright veldt]

Idk how much to take from this given they only bring up defense as a possibility, only one of the many others which involve strain and pressure from within the herd, which seems more likely to me.

[tiny holly]

having a tail that is actually fairly stiff and stable actually makes it a better counterbalance rather than a flexible one that wiggles around every time you take a step

[pearl briar]

we're back at "Dinosaur tail is stiff, not flexible like those of Cats"

[sullen cairn]

yeah this 2020 abstract seems to lean towards social accidents but the two aren't mutually exclusive

[light oxide]

Regardless, I think we can all agree that hadrosaurs most likely kicked . . . And they could kick pretty damn hard. XD

[bright veldt]

Tails in such animals were also very valuable in housing the muscles for movement, so idk how helpful it would be to face that part of yourself to a predator. Better than the head and neck I guess but still.

[covert lintel]

yep! there's a reason why dromaeosaurs went the extra mile by turning basically their whole tail into a stiffened rod by ossifying some tendons (i think? i think that's what it was. lmk if it isn't)

[white matrix]

What is everyone's opinion on Utahraptor?

[pearl briar]

see
told ya
their tail is stiff, not flexible like those of cats

[tough parcel]

If you're running away, a predator's on your booty cheeks and one of the largest organs on your body is within hitting range, I feel like a tail swipe would be logical

[sullen cairn]

very cool thing

[nocturne gazelle]

Raptors kinda overrated tbh, but the whole wing counterbalance theory is pretty neat.

[tiny holly]

I'm sure hadrosaurs bit too. I mean I don't think it would do much, but basically any cornered animal with a mouth will bite if you get too close to the bitey parts. And if they get lucky it can actually work as a deterrent, just not often.

[little mauve]

Hadrosaurs had em too

[astral kelp]

Yeah I don’t think a hadrosaur is going to stop mid run and say hmm “I think I want to kick instead”

[bright veldt]

I mean this is implying that they even had the flexibility to do so? Most ornithopod tails were stiff tmk, and I’ve never really seen studies actually dedicated to figuring this out.

[tough parcel]

The base would still be flexible, no animal to my knowledge completely stiffened out their tail

[nocturne gazelle]

The issue is people struggle with finding a happy middle ground. Something can have the capability to defend itself while still preferring to run (after all we don't have respawns irl). And something can choose to fight despite not having much of a capability to fight.

[light oxide]

Eh . . . There have been studies that suggested that if a predator tore through a certain muscle at the base of the tail, the victim will most likely be crippled.

Hence why we see battle injuries on the face of predators from other rivals instead of the other region -- a heavily crippled animal is a dead one.

[sullen cairn]

carnotaurus sorta did

[tiny holly]

It doesn't help that we don't really have a single thing we can base this on, there's no large land animals today with tails big enough for it to even be an effective strategy in the first place, so that makes it harder to evaluate whether its a behaviour that can happen

[bright veldt]

Teraneurans in general had stiff tails. It’s why I’ve always rolled my eyes at these animals having tail attacks. It’s not stiff as a rod but it’s not practical to use in that manner either.

[white matrix]

With how fast Carnotaurus would have ran it would need a stability

[tough parcel]

@meager sedge Can we please get this slowmode lowered, it's not conductive for discussions + there's no reason for it to be so high compared to #path-of-titans

[light oxide]

Nah -- they'll just keep running instead.

[covert lintel]

yeah, mammals unlocked the secret tech of "just don't put giant essential muscles in your tail lol???" . and so, they can have skinny tails
this comes with the drawback of It's Slightly Harder To Be Bipedal Now

[light osprey]

Caudofemoralis

[astral kelp]

Watch them mute you, rip my homie falcon.

[tiny holly]

Mammals unlocked the fascinating technology of a fat ass to power your legs 👍

[nocturne gazelle]

I understand the cd rn tbh, there's a lot of folks here rn

[pearl briar]

does 31 mph carno speed estimated is still accurate?
or he became slower/faster?

[bright veldt]

I kinda doubt an animal that big moving that fast.

[tough parcel]

We do not need a one minute slow mode, there's no "moderation" reasons for that

[meager sedge]

Slow-mode is used to help moderate channels when there are a lot of people talking. Moderators will lower it as they see fit and are able to. Please do not ping regarding this or discuss slow-modes, as per our rules.

[astral kelp]

Ok they didn’t mute you at least lol, but lame.

[white matrix]

Welp

[light oxide]

Depends.

Last I heard, Randomdinos did a chart with some speed calculations and had Carnotaurus at 45 km/h. Unless that's outdated now, of course.

[sullen cairn]

totally reliable carnotaurus speed calculations are somewhat hindered by the lack of a complete tibia as well

[light oxide]

That is true, sadly.

[bright veldt]

I’m not going to talk about it beyond this point for obvious reasons, but we all know this. This server is moderated with the intention of to just control and nothing more rather than to actually make a productive place for its community. I’ve been on moderation for games like this one before. There is no good reason for this kind of moderation.

[little mauve]

Yeah without that I'm skeptical of the idea that it was fast solely due to the caudofemoralis

[stiff osprey]

tbf, giraffes are only slightly smaller than Carnotaurus, and they can arguably move up to 37 mph. They have much more efficient lower limbs for running than Carno, but also much less powerful thigh musculature, so 31 mph Carnotaurus is not unreasonable

[white matrix]

I believe Carnotaurus was quick but it turning while running was almost impossible

[sullen cairn]

yeah cause the hips and tail had to move as pretty much one unit

[stiff osprey]

that is more or less true, which makes its hunting strategy really weird. Don't need to run that fast to chase sauropods, but you can't really catch small (relatively) ornithopods without decent turning

[white matrix]

Carnotaurus would have most likely been an ambush predator solely .

[sullen cairn]

carnotaurus was a kickboxer

[astral kelp]

Carnotaurus was a drag racer

[white matrix]

Carnotaurus was a rocket

[light oxide]

Meanwhile, Jane over here being much faster at the relatively same size and having MUCH better turning.

[sullen cairn]

femur/tibia ratio go brrrrr

[bright veldt]

I personally think it’s likely that tyrannosaurus young became independent fairly quickly but still stayed within the territory of their parents. They got to a size quite quickly to where the only real threat they had to worry about would be unrelated tyrannosaurs.

[stiff osprey]

Their incredible speed and not really going after the same prey would probably make it easy (relatively) to live in the same territory as the adults, and then once they sexually matured they could be booted out. Not unlike how male crocs are afaik

[sullen cairn]

Luckily we already have the definitive guide to carnotaurus paleoecology already

[stiff osprey]

Thank you Tierzoo, very cool.

[covert lintel]

oh dear

[sullen cairn]

i will never forgive tierzoo for making people think cheetahs are incapable of existing on their own

[light osprey]

Is La Colonia close enough for it to be slapped the contemporary label?

[light oxide]

There has actually been a study on tyrannosaurs about their possible lives and growth.

The hatchlings grew quickly to their juvenile forms, to where they were pretty much independent and could fend for themselves. And they actually stay at this stage for a LONG while, up until near their sexual maturity where they rapidly grew in size, to their adult sizes. Some even died at these rapid growth spurts.

What is also intriguing is that the mortality was high for hatchling and adult tyrannosaurs, but it was actually very low for the juveniles up to the slim subadults before the growth spurts.

[covert lintel]

i will never forgive tierzoo in general
channel's meant to be educational but so many misconceptions have been spread because of it, about both prehistoric life and modern life

[sullen cairn]

they're maastrichtian argentina that's about it and orkoraptor's like mid-campanian

[bright veldt]

Cheetahs and carnotaurus aren’t comparable at all ecologically, even ignoring how cheetahs being bad at survival isn’t true. Carnotaurus was the unrivaled apex predator of its ecosystem, and had a very high bite force. It certainly wasn’t a small prey specialist.

[stiff osprey]

Cheetahs, pandas, and koalas would all be doing fine if it weren't for humans shooting them all / obliterating their habitat until recently

[light osprey]

Check your temporal ranges fellas, never get caught lacking like that theorist did smh

[sullen cairn]

are pteranodontids even recorded from south america

[stiff osprey]

Maip is Maastrichtian, so it might well have bullied Carnotaurus off kills, but their formations are a decent distance apart so maybe not

[white matrix]

I imagine any type of flyer would have traveled thousands of miles similar to birds.

[light osprey]

Don’t think so, Azdarchids yes.

[bright veldt]

Their habitats are also different afaik. La Colonia was a warmer plains region while Maip’s formation was more chilly.

[light oxide]

That and they may have had different ecological niches

[tiny holly]

Most of the time you see animals end up in a genetic bottleneck with more inbreeding than normal its due to outside forces, such as climate/geography change splitting up populations or yknow. Humans. Thylacine are a great example, they went extinct on the mainland likely at least in part due to dingos. The tasmanian population was smaller than ideal so there was a lot of inbreeding, even before white humans finished the job and wiped them out they were in the decline

[sullen cairn]

the 300kg austroraptor bullying a carnotaurus off a carcase

[white matrix]

The idea a bird that is no more than a few feet tall being 600 plus pounds is absurd

[light osprey]

Maip when it travels 100s of miles just to bully another apex predator from its kill.

[bright veldt]

Also just going to point this out, while inbreeding is bad for any species, that doesn’t automatically mean it will doom them. There is no statistical correlation between inbreeding and extinctions/population-dieoffs. Some species aren’t bothered by a lack of gene pool and/or incest and can bounce back.

[sullen cairn]

orkoraptor travelling millions of years to bully a predator half a ton larger than it off a kill

[covert lintel]

are you sure about that

[white matrix]

What is the size of that human

[stiff osprey]

I've no idea what Carnotaurus was doing, but megaraptorans are heavily geared towards going after prey around their own size or smaller. Unless Carno was going after even smaller prey

[sullen cairn]

it's nice that la colonia has like no dinosaurs besides carnotaurus

[light osprey]

Probably the same as any human silhouette

[stiff osprey]

it's a marine formation, Carnotaurus was living in the bottom of the ocean 😂

[light oxide]

Hmm . . . Ye do make a good point.

Actually, I just thought of something-- different preferred habitats? It is said that Torvosaurus and Ceratosaurus may have preferred forests to hunt in while the Allosaurus may have preferred the more open areas.

[bright veldt]

I’m curious. Is it possible that the stiffness/strength of carnotaurus vertebrae and lack of flexibility would’ve favored them on great impacts? I’m not suggesting ramming prey, I’m asking if tackling prey at very high speeds could’ve been a hunting strategy.

[tiny holly]

stomps you to death with my hooves vibe ig

[sullen cairn]

OH I GET IT

austroraptor bullied carnotaurus by tailriding them because of their bad turning radius

[light osprey]

If I had to guess, Carnotaurus had to be fast to hunt some big Elasmarians

[elfin pulsar]

Scanova said smthn about this earlier, iirc Cerato was open field/plains stuff

[covert lintel]

it's not going to make austroraptor small unless everything except austroraptor is the Ant Version. i mean, utahraptor's right there

[stiff osprey]

I recall there being a study on Carnotaurus's neck that showed it was much more built than that of say, Majungasaurus. So while their skull is not built for ramming, swinging down on prey at high speeds is probably something it did

Though depending on the definition of tackling, that would require Carno to fall over along with its prey, which is not gonna be fun for a near 2 t biped

[white matrix]

I'm gonna be honest I feel like Austroraptor would break

[bright veldt]

The latest studies provide a different if very interesting case on Morrison ecology. TLDR, torvosaurus favored forest edge habitats to ambush big game. Ceratosaurus favored open plains and shrubland. Allosaurus didn’t seem to care and could be found basically everywhere in the Morrison, although it’s smaller teeth and long arms might’ve suggested a smaller prey base to avoid torvosaurus competition, if still capable of tackling larger prey given the opportunity.

[light osprey]

Here’s the Wiki size charts we happy now?

[white matrix]

Could still beat it in a fight lol jk

[light oxide]

Ah, I see. Thanks for that info, mate.

Hmm . . . Could a maip be more suited to tackling prey?

[bright veldt]

We still don’t know much on megaraptorans tbh.

[tiny holly]

they've been a weird enigma for a very long time now

[stiff osprey]

Megaraptorans preferring denser environments than Carnotaurus at least makes total sense, though we lack any statistical evidence

[white matrix]

Honestly to be fair literally everything was super sized during that time

[light osprey]

I think Chorillo was pretty open. Maybe. I’m gonna go check

[sullen cairn]

direct size comparison

[bright veldt]

Austro ain’t having fun

[white matrix]

Now imagine that staring you down honestly when I saw the replica of Sue they made for Tyrannosaurus Rex I was shocked. She was gorgeous

[light osprey]

Ok, Chorillo overlies La Irene, which is a deltaic environment

[stiff osprey]

I know a few people who get paleoclimates more than I do, and they think Chorrillo was more or less like a cloud forest

[light osprey]

Ooh and the Austroraptor/Carnotaurus comparison is pretty neat, Allen and La Colonia are pretty close to each other

[sullen cairn]

Carno and Maip too

[covert lintel]

fwiw i'm not arguing that austroraptor could reliably 1v1 a carnotaurus. simply that it wasn't a small dromaeosaurid(/unenlagiid depending on whether or not we think unenlagiidae exists atm (determined by throwing a dart at a board, as is tradition))
it's not as chunky as utahraptor, but it's a decently big lad

[light oxide]

Wait -- why would an Austroraptor be challenging a Carnotaurus in the first place? I thought they were mainly feeding on fish?

[light osprey]

I think it’s just to show it’s not small

[light oxide]

I see

[covert lintel]

idk, ask the screenshotted person who said carno could've been bullied by austro

[white matrix]

Anyone that thinks Carno got bullied by Austro a literal bird in raptor clothing that fed off fish should get a reality check

[sullen cairn]

because vultures are as well all know very frequent kleptoparasites of cheetahs

[light oxide]

Even then, there have been records of cheetahs having enough of the vultures and clapping them.

[covert lintel]

most raptors are birds in raptor clothing. theyre birdtype beasts

[bright veldt]

Table’s playin

[light osprey]

What are we defining as a raptor? Accipitridae are called raptors too

[tiny holly]

Yeah it's a mild frustration of mine that raptor has become such a broad term used for dromeos and troodontids, when it has a long standing history as the word applied to birds of prey

[sullen cairn]

Well you see, cheetahs are fast. You know what else is fast? Carnotaurus. And cheetah are, as tierzoo told me, incapable of keeping kills (they actually only lose ~10% and can afford to lose 1/4th of them but that isn't the point). So clearly, Carnotaurus was a routine victim to kleptoparasitism by unenlagiines 1/7th its weight.

[light osprey]

This is real and true. Almost as true as my supreme genus

[stiff osprey]

not gonna lie, megaraptorans kleptoparasiting abelisaurs actually sounds real interesting

though at least the northern end of South America had Maip-length abelisaurs... might not work well with those guys around

[light osprey]

Organismus vivus needs a paper stat. It’s a stroke of pure brilliance.

[white matrix]

What...

[sullen cairn]

tratayenia would've eaten llukalkan and viavenator for breakfast, same with that huge sao paulo one and thanos

[light osprey]

It’s an all encompassing binomial name, works for literally anything considered a living organism. Shenanigans in another paleo-chat

[covert lintel]

ah, my favourite organism, Living Organism

[stiff osprey]

with the mess that brazilian stratigraphy is, the huge megaraptoran might have lived with the even huger abelisaur 💀

[sullen cairn]

god i really wish i could post memes in this channel because i have the perfect one for this

[white matrix]

I absolutely love Organismus Vivus
Dm me it

[sullen cairn]

iirc the closest abelisaurid/megaraptoran relationship in size was abelisaurus and aerosteon in anacleto if either one actually lived there

[stiff osprey]

wtf was Ibirania doing being a dwarf titanosaur in an environment with a giant megaraptoran

[white matrix]

Show me the meme please

[bright veldt]

There’s tiny sauropods in the Morrison too yknow

[sullen cairn]

at least bonatitan lived with <500kg carnivores

[pearl briar]

anyone remembers a sauropod named "Jobaria"?

[bright veldt]

Idk how -1ton sauropods managed in the Morrison but they did somehow

[light osprey]

Feels like Allen Formation is the only sensibly reconstructable SA Maastrichtian environment

[white matrix]

I mean I'd imagine their tails could act as whips

[pearl briar]

Morrison Formation in Nutshell: they have too much sauropod

[bright veldt]

Whips on diplodocoids acted primarily as communication rather than defense.

[low badge]

Can I have some help

[compact leaf]

that size chart also has some major wonkiness to it with some old reconstructions too

[light osprey]

POV only the megafauna are getting preserved

[novel atlas]

Still probably won't say no to smacking something that looks at them funny from behind

[covert lintel]

theory from a guy who knows little:
maybe they stayed in more heavily forested areas to avoid larger theropods?

[white matrix]

That's...actually reasonable

[bright veldt]

That’s likely. It’s a trend with smaller species in the Morrison in general (except for the Morrison ankylosaurs apparently).

[white matrix]

Hehehe boney tail go brrrrrrr

[sullen cairn]

pycno's from the same locale as a megaraptoran but idk how big it is and can't find any figures
and urc 44-r's maybe with something adamantina's too stupid to try and figure that out

[light osprey]

Yeah what the heck is even in that formation

[stiff osprey]

I'll see if i can find that one

[sullen cairn]

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/316276027_New_dinosaur_remains_and_the_tetrapod_fauna_from_the_Upper_Cretaceous_of_Mato_Grosso_State_central_Brazil

I spent one night reading on brazilian stratigraphy to figure out pycno's locale and not I'm not touching that again

[light osprey]

Oh look, Gondwanatitan

[sullen cairn]

Ew adamantina

[light osprey]

South America still looking for an ounce of variety in 90% of their formations

[compact leaf]

brazilian stratigraphy is a nightmare

[sullen cairn]

As much as dating Adamantina is a nightmare and I hate it I do find it funny how it’s dominated by various notosuchians with the exception of the 4t abelisaur

[compact leaf]

in fairness south america does have the weird dicraeosaurid formations where we have no idea what’s going on

[light osprey]

Dicraeosaurids in South America sounds somewhat normal to me

[sullen cairn]

I know bajada colorada’s a bit odd but that’s just cause it’s clinging onto some of its Jurassic fauana

[stiff osprey]

did you look at stuff like Marília and Presidente Prudente as well or just Mato Grosso? cause i am curious how they work

[compact leaf]

the fact that they’re there is normal, what’s weird is that we have no idea what was going on in the ecosystem around them

[sullen cairn]

Cambambe basin stuff mostly cause bauru group stuff was pretty much just trying to figure out adamantina without a satisfying conclusion

[light osprey]

Hold on is there a Stegosaurian in La Amarga??

[sullen cairn]

There’s a good paper on cambambe I just need to find it again and then there’s like a dozen on dating adamantina

[compact leaf]

let me dig a bit but there’s definitely one around the formation brachytrachelopan is in, there’s a lot of weird undescribed stegosaurians knocking around

[light osprey]

La Amarga is like 125mya, I guess I underestimated their longevity

[compact leaf]

ok it is the one I’m thinking of, it’s not named but there is one there

[stiff osprey]

and they all disagree with eachother

[sullen cairn]

https://www.periodicos.rc.biblioteca.unesp.br/index.php/geociencias/article/download/12026/8740/
cambambe basin overview

[compact leaf]

there’s a few trackways and bits from cedar mountain and nearby formations that seem to be from a stegosaurian too

[elder kettle]

How big was achillobators snout?

[compact leaf]

I would love to get the chance to dig through all the random undescribed stuff from early cretaceous NA, there’s so much weird stuff that we just have hints of

[light osprey]

Yeah I don’t hear much about early Cretaceous NA now that I think about it just Cloverly I suppose. And that’s not even that early.

[compact leaf]

there’s some weirdness, rumors and evidence of stegosaurians in places, some inexplicable migrants, and a lot of brachiosaurids with big temporal gaps between them

[stiff osprey]

about a foot long, black bar is a meter

[light osprey]

Who doesn’t a love good spotty Mesozoic fossil record. It’s so lovely isn’t it

[compact leaf]

therizinosaurs are another weird one, we found a pretty old english one recently (the first european one afaik), iirc it was wessex too

[sullen cairn]

alright so for adamantina temporal constraints judd 2017 suggested late campanian-possible maastrichtian through biostratigraphy and magnetostratigraphy, castro et al 2018 suggested coniacian-possible maastrichtian through zircon dating, geroto and bertini 2018 suggested campanian-possible late (but not latest) maastrichtian age through biostratigraphy, brusatte et al. 2017 and Martinelli et al. 2018 suggested latest-santonian-cenomanian age through the interdigitated uberaba formation, and silva et al. 2021 suggested a santonian-possible maastrichtian age through biostratigraphy
and that's just from the past six years

[elder kettle]

So when it releases in-game it won't be big like the Utah mod?

[stiff osprey]

jesus christ

Achillo is ~20% smaller than Utahraptor, so probably halfway between the KTO utah and default Laten

[light osprey]

A Therizinosaur in Wessex? What on Earth does that mean

[elder kettle]

Bettt

[compact leaf]

I found it again it’s thecocoelurus, it might not be wessex but it’s still early cretaceous england, it’s position is debated but most recently Naish and some colleagues put it back in therizinosauria close to falcarius

the whole situation with it is weird, all of the 3 competing options for what it is would be bizarre in that time and place

[tiny holly]

I'm not too surprised, we have therizinosaurs in both NA and asia. What with europe being inbetween I think it was just a matter of time before we found one

[light osprey]

I assumed it was a shared transpacific biota

[compact leaf]

it is a bit younger than the other basal ones so it makes the most sense for it to be a therizinosaurian, the other options are ornithomimosaur and oviraptorosaur

[light osprey]

Now that I read Wessex Formation is just a melting pot of confusion

[compact leaf]

wessex is one of my favorite formations it’s weird and I love it lol

[light osprey]

Are British early Cretaceous Eudromaeosaurs a thing?

Oh and there’s Tyrannosauroids too

[sullen cairn]

europe generally likes having cladistically unstable small theropods

[sullen cairn]

vectiraptor?

and are you talking about nuthetes or eotyrannus for tyrannosauroids

[light osprey]

Yeah, and some other Velociraptorine (wtf lol)/Proceratosauroid

[compact leaf]

there’s a possible turiasaur that just happens to be there too

basically all of the wessex sauropods minus the turiasaur have had a stage where they either initially weren’t a brachiosaurid or were but got shifted to something else, and then a closer look gets taken at them and they get moved back into it

[light osprey]

Is all of Macronaria stinky?

[sullen cairn]

I still find it funny how there's an angloposeidon and a francoposeidon and neither is formally described

[compact leaf]

brachiosauridae is the most stable in the clade it’s just that most of them are undescribed, other than them everything in it is stinky yeah

[light osprey]

Tbf it feels like if you go deep enough, there’s a sh*t storm in every Dinosaurian clade

[compact leaf]

especially basal titanosaurs, half of what’s there just got thrown there because it was initially described as a jurassic group but they decided it was too late in time for that, but nobody has gotten around to putting them in a better spot

[bright veldt]

mfw the very foundation of it is messed up (nobody knows exactly ornithscians, theropods, and sauropodomorphs go relative to each other)

[sullen cairn]

furileusauria doesn't do a whole lot which is nice
I'd just say brachyrostra but dahalokely and rahiolisaurus kinda throw a wrench in that

[tiny holly]

And because the evidence that would help us figure that out is all gonna be early-mid triassic age, good luck 👍

[sullen cairn]

actually the best clade is alioramini because there's a grand total of three specimens across the entire clade

[light osprey]

No gifs? Why is it so stinky in here

[honest wave]

https://tenor.com/view/huh-cat-gif-26460616

[light osprey]

For some reason discord told me I was @ed 9 times

[nova socket]

God help us all in terms of this.

[undone parcel]

any updates on the Turkana Grits Abelisaur?

[sullen cairn]

100% real updated skeletal

In all seriousness though not much has really happened since random found the actual skeletal and the skull recon started floating around

[astral kelp]

this guy needs to get described

[sullen cairn]

I’m mostly excited that it’s like the second abelisaur specimen in Africa known from more than a single cranial fragment or vertebra

Or a load of indeterminate teeth

[light osprey]

Maastrichtian Africa coming to life it seems

[sullen cairn]

If it is a majungasaurine that’d be cool since it’d be our first definitive record of them from mainland Africa

Plus they kinda had to be there at some point anyways considering their presence in Europe

[undone parcel]

pretty sured theyd be on mainland Africa if they made it to India

[sullen cairn]

Yeah they’ve been in Europe since the Albian and their earliest possible record in Madagascar is the turonian

That said you would expect some in the reasonably well sampled African cenomanian rocks but most abelisaurids there end up as rugops sp. or abelisauridae indet.

[light osprey]

Just happy one the few remaining parts of the Maastrichtian picture are being filled in

[undone parcel]

isnt there another supposed giant one in Morocco

[sullen cairn]

CMN 50403 and OLPH 025 from the Kem Kem are around 10.7m and 8.1m respectively

[undone parcel]

i remember whn rugops was the Kem Kem abelisaur

[sullen cairn]

There’s several assigned to rugops sp. there

But yeah both of the big ones are indeterminate

[undone parcel]

i also heard of a giant brazilian one but hey

[sullen cairn]

URC 44-r

10.3m maxilla

And that’s all the 10m+ abelisaurids we know

[undone parcel]

says its referred to a subadult...thats terrifying

[sullen cairn]

People speculate it’s an adult pycnonemosaurus since that’s a subadult

But without overlapping elements and probably not being coeval we can’t really know

[undone parcel]

ahh the debate of Pycno v Ekrix of biggest current abelisaur

[sullen cairn]

Also called: why skull scaling is bad

[undone parcel]

case and point: erythosuchians

[sullen cairn]

Although ekrix is still fairly large by abelisaurid standards

[undone parcel]

oh yea isnt it probably bigger then Carno

[sullen cairn]

Nah carno’s longer and heavier

[undone parcel]

granted we probably dont know carnos average due to the curse of terrible abelisaur preservation bias

[sullen cairn]

Are there any named non-majungasaurines even known from anything besides the holotype

Besides referred teeth

[undone parcel]

probably Majunga itself

oh wait..

[white matrix]

We talkin bout sausages? Man makes me wanna have a hot dog lmao

[undone parcel]

the sasauges bite back

[white matrix]

Angy sausages

[undone parcel]

still blows me away that Majunga is so long but short enough to look most people in the eye

[sullen cairn]

I love/hate my sausage Titanovenator

[undone parcel]

i dont care what Turkana is named Titanovenator is canon

[white matrix]

I love all sausages i just love abelisaurs theyre basically hot dog sausages on two legs waiting to be put in hot dog buns

[undone parcel]

well non euro-AfroAsian ones arent

[white matrix]

OMGG thats so adorableee

[undone parcel]

its like when i hold my lizards upside down and they cant do shut as i give them belly rubs

[white matrix]

Some lizards dont have a diaphragm like beardies dont so putting them upside down makes them unable to breathe just as an fyi

[sullen cairn]

You could probably pet a smaller manjungasaurine

[undone parcel]

....I AM A TERRIBLE PERSON

[sullen cairn]

It’d be like lioness sized but it’d be doable

[undone parcel]

doable in the sense that yod die probably

[white matrix]

Nah just get a hot dog bun

[undone parcel]

Majunga is within the group of dinosaurs id classify as the right size to hunt humans

[white matrix]

All mighty sausages would eat us

[sullen cairn]

Hunter becomes hunted

[undone parcel]

people call me crazy when i say the Juvie rexes would be worse then a adult..

[white matrix]

Faster, more stamina, still strong, more endurable, more stam yeah id see a scenario like that

[white matrix]

Tho i imagine theyd be tameable with a hot dog bun

[sullen cairn]

It’d also actually think it’d be worth murdering me

[undone parcel]

also adults wouldnt waste precious energy on a human sized morsel thatll give hardly anything back

[white matrix]

Yup

[sullen cairn]

The larger hot dogs are decent riding size come to think of it

[undone parcel]

probably not good for their backs

[sullen cairn]

Right

[undone parcel]

trade a good back for flexibility

[white matrix]

Id ride a megalania but riding a prehistoric sausage would be even better

[light osprey]

Both don’t sound optimal

[undone parcel]

screw riding it thats my guard dog

[white matrix]

A wiener dog on two legs named princess

[undone parcel]

a prehistoric sausage unicorn named tinkles

[white matrix]

Or sparkles

[sullen cairn]

Or Gabriel

[undone parcel]

im still upset about Elasmotheriums horn disapearing

no longer the Siberian unicorn

[sullen cairn]

It looks like a mood now

[undone parcel]

so..the largest basilosaur and the smallest in a week

[sullen cairn]

The cetacean pendulum remains in balance

[undone parcel]

then we will find some whale that disrupts it

[sullen cairn]

The most normal sized basilosaur

[undone parcel]

a normal whale

[sullen cairn]

Maybe a tiny whale that becomes a normal whale

[undone parcel]

its why i love the Piscu. you have Megalodon, various murder sperm whales, sea going gavials and sea sloths and then...just small baleen whales..just average

[sullen cairn]

He's trying his best okay

[undone parcel]

he gets murdered by meg and livy everyday ok its a hard life

[sullen cairn]

But he can take it

[undone parcel]

the sea sloths are still the weirdest ones

[sullen cairn]

miocene's just weird

[undone parcel]

its a shame WWB barely talked about it

[light osprey]

Anyone know of any other Maastrichtian African sites?

[sullen cairn]

couche phosphate beds

[undone parcel]

...i dont know..i know its loaded up till at least mid cretaceous

[astral kelp]

tooth scaling

[undone parcel]

theres that big pterosaur site along the Mediterranean that PHP 1 used with Barbaridactylus and Phosphatodraco

[light osprey]

Those are Marine deposits right?

[undone parcel]

and Morocco is loaded with various mosasaurs and that weird tube faced marine turtle

[sullen cairn]

yeah it has load of mosasaurus but also chenanisaurus, that tiny aguibjia whatever hadrosaur and some titanosaur

ajnabia

[undone parcel]

so i assume morroco was mostly coastal or island chain deposits

[sullen cairn]

probably

[light osprey]

Oh, it’s just the Ouled Abdoun Basin?

[sullen cairn]

yeah but the whole basin extends well into the cenozoic

[undone parcel]

i swear i know thebasin for something mesozoic

[light osprey]

I got so excited when I thought Dasornis was Maastrichtian the first time I saw it

[undone parcel]

cenozoic not mesozoic

[sullen cairn]

there's duwi formation in egypt too which has a maastrichtian abelisaur tooth

[undone parcel]

yay more scant abelisaurs

[sullen cairn]

there's even more teeth from arabia but I forgot the formation

and then there's that weird sudanese one that apparently got redated from cenomanian to campanian-maastrichtian

[light osprey]

The one underlied by Quseir?

[undone parcel]

wait M. hoffmani is in Ouled?

[sullen cairn]

just checked it's adaffa formation but idk about the sedimontology

[undone parcel]

oh Paleophis is in ouled

[light osprey]

Oh it’s a darned marine deposit again

Anything in southern or central Africa?

[undone parcel]

possible arambourgiana in Ouled..

[sullen cairn]

doubt it

the only cretaceous thing I even know in southern southern africa off my head is kirkwood and that's not late

[undone parcel]

pretty difficult to dig in the rainforest in all fairness

[light osprey]

I mean… I found one formation. I was hoping there would be a teensy bit more than that

[sullen cairn]

which is it

[light osprey]

Mocuio dips into the Maastrichtian

[undone parcel]

again creteacous africa just..isnt great...then again i keep remembering how terrible the Tendaguru is for theropods right now

[sullen cairn]

Two taxa
amazing

the weird thig is the sudanese thing has presumably multiple carcharadontosaurid taxa

[light osprey]

It’s something. One of them is even a Pteranodontian. But now you feel my struggle hehe

[undone parcel]

pterandontidae sucks bro...its a ghost lineage and those are just terrible

[sullen cairn]

tendaguru theropods are just generally really crap taxa

[light osprey]

They seem to like Africa maybe

[undone parcel]

i crave a new african carch thats big..or at least more tyrannotitan material

[sullen cairn]

there's that massive kirkwood one

[light osprey]

How old is Kirkwood

[undone parcel]

theres a carch in kirkwood?

[sullen cairn]

initially it was classified as that but it might be a megalosaurid

[undone parcel]

oh its jurassic

[light osprey]

Excitement reduced

[sullen cairn]

or early cretaceous

[undone parcel]

paranthodon and Nqwebasaurus

[light osprey]

Wait a minute what is this Pteranodontian doing in Russia

[undone parcel]

volgadraco?

[light osprey]

Ye

[undone parcel]

uhh i dont know if the Ptera stance changed or not due to Pteradontian taxonomy sucking

[sullen cairn]

there's a czech one too

[light osprey]

Damn bruh someone fix this clade

[undone parcel]

i just want more Kileskus material

[light osprey]

Ew, not another freak

[undone parcel]

what?

[sullen cairn]

what'd kileskus ever do

[light osprey]

Middle Jurassic. Automatically stinky

[undone parcel]

....ok i agree about the time but Kileskus is a beautiful animal just like all proceratosaurs

[sullen cairn]

and aristocotus is a really cool specific name

[undone parcel]

i just wish Sinotyrannus got as much love as Yuty for biggest proceratosaur

[sullen cairn]

it's also actually stable as a proceratosaur

[undone parcel]

also more then likley coexisted with yuty

[sullen cairn]

jiufotang immediately overlies yixian so it might not have

[light osprey]

Yeah 5 million years between them or something like that

[undone parcel]

ahh i see...speasking of mid jurassic..the Yangchuanosaurus head shape...how recent is that

[sullen cairn]

since Y. magnus was named in the 80s

[undone parcel]

oh i remeber when i was youngerr it was still vaguely generic allosaur

[sullen cairn]

shangyouensis type has a pretty normal skull but mangus had the funny skull and got lumped into shangyouensis

[undone parcel]

whats the chances this could translate to Sinraptor or would this be a Yang specific

[sullen cairn]

sinraptor already has a skull

[undone parcel]

oh thats right i forgot...

[sullen cairn]

even less weird than either of yang's

[light osprey]

W Sinraptor for being a generic Allosauroid

[sullen cairn]

S. hepingensis has a weirder skull but that's probably not sinraptor so still w

[astral kelp]

pretty sure dan has an updated sinraptor skeletal

[sullen cairn]

yeah I'm just too lazy to look for it

that's hepingensis

[quaint isle]

Isn't Maip just Austrolovenator

[undone parcel]

isnt heping the debated one between the 2 speciees

[sullen cairn]

here we go i'm pretty sure this is the most up-to-date dongi

[undone parcel]

not even close. Maip is a giant megaraptoran fron argentina while Australovenator is fromAustralia

[light osprey]

There is literally no overlap other than being Megaraptoran

[quaint isle]

Oh ok. Thanks for the clarification

[sullen cairn]

look at megaraptoridae actually being useful as a clade for once

[undone parcel]

its great for cool names

[sullen cairn]

maip is one of the dumbest sounding names ever

tratayenia and aerosteon sound cool
maip does not sound cool

[undone parcel]

its meaning is great though cause if you interpret it right its a cold wind from the arm that only takes a single swipe, also to be fair most native names arent cool cause its just native tongue..

[sullen cairn]

and then you have boring macrothorax

[undone parcel]

i mean thats just describing its unusually big body for a megaraptoran

[light osprey]

Maip has the edgelord meaning if I’m not mistaken

[woeful falcon]

Its meaning isn't even that, that's just a description of the being its named for

[sullen cairn]

shadow of death or something like that

[undone parcel]

"the Shadow of Death that kills witjh a cool wind"

[light osprey]

Aerosteon is definitely a better binomial name for sure

[woeful falcon]

People took it and really ran with that as a 1 to 1 meaning

[sullen cairn]

I like murusraptor and megaraptor because they sound similar and represent a succesive line of megaraptorans in the neuquen subgroup

[undone parcel]

I still say Wiehienvenator has one of the best informal nicknames to this day

[sullen cairn]

ignoring los bastos but there's nothing there anyways

[undone parcel]

is the lightning thief considered Australo or is there decent differences

[sullen cairn]

different

[undone parcel]

good cause its a cool nickname

[sullen cairn]

it's notably older too

[undone parcel]

isnt it possibly bigger too?

[sullen cairn]

yup

it's from the same formation as rapator

[undone parcel]

remember when Aerosteon was the Carchs in Alphas Egg...we've come so far

[sullen cairn]

and everyone would argue over why they called them carcharadontosaurus

[undone parcel]

because we still made giganotosaurus look like that at the time....

air date 2003 yea this was before pretty much all the other giganotosaurines and Mapu wouldnt be named as its own thing till 2006

[stiff osprey]

the irony that Alpha's Egg Aerosteon is one of the two most accurate Giganotosaurus in media ever...

[undone parcel]

the irony that jwd giga wasnt far off withe nueral tissue if meraxes did indeed had a hump like structure

[stiff osprey]

they put the hump on the opposite end of the back 💀

[undone parcel]

oh i know but points for predicting something

[woeful falcon]

Was one of my first introductions to carcharodontosaurids, Alpha's Egg

[sullen cairn]

and somehow aerosteon ended up being anacleto with aucasaurus after the mess of where it was from so bonus points

[woeful falcon]

That I would hardly call a prediction personally when conc exists with an actual protruding structure on the back

[undone parcel]

i still ascertain that as much as i like JWD giga the chins the most accurate part i think

[sullen cairn]

anacleto's predator guilds were just allen on steroids

[undone parcel]

I yearn for Gojirasaurus validation even if its not possible

[light osprey]

I had no idea what this looked liked. Just looked it up, and yeah… it’s something alright

[undone parcel]

also some of the best dino sound design

[sullen cairn]

you will have your indeterminate large coelophysoid and you will be happy

[undone parcel]

no its bad enough kaijutitan or whatever isnt japanese i wont lose gojirasaurus

[sullen cairn]

I wouldn't call new mexico japanese either

[undone parcel]

hey gojira has the size to deserve it kaijutitans...not even in logknosaurian size class

[sullen cairn]

either way megapnosaurus is clearly the superior coelophysoid name

[undone parcel]

no Syntarsus

flashbacks to the spinechilling WDRA Dilo scream

[sullen cairn]

it sounded more like someone flicking a doorstopper tbh

[woeful falcon]

What doorstoppers have you heard in your life

[sullen cairn]

springy ones

[stiff osprey]

bro is living in an alternate universe where springs make the sounds of the damned in the ninth circle of hell instead of ''sproing''

[sullen cairn]

but when they sproing really fast

[undone parcel]

when they go fast it sounds like lucifers cat screaming

[woeful falcon]

slightly off topic but I always wondered why WDRA sounds were always kinda plain jane but then for dilo they dialed it to an 11

[undone parcel]

its 2001 post jurassic park gotta show it aint tiny

[sullen cairn]

but dandakosaurus was from like the same time and was over 2t as larramendi told me and larramendi is never wrong

[undone parcel]

isnt dandako like rterrible material

[sullen cairn]

yeah and chimeric

[undone parcel]

i may have both Larramendis books but i doubt much of it..the art is mostly why i got them

[sullen cairn]

I mostly like it for that and cause it has obscure material

[undone parcel]

ill give it that.. it also gives decent art of bones

[stiff osprey]

as a certified Larramendi scaling hater, most of it is quite reasonable... just has a few notable exceptions, most of which are from them thinking tooth scaling was a good idea

[undone parcel]

i hear rumors theres finally gonna be a ornithscian one

[sullen cairn]

Yeah best part of the book is having reasonable estimates for lots of obscure taxa it’s really hard to find figures or dimensions for

[undone parcel]

try finding size estimates for insert obscure theropod number 10 here

meanwhile t.rex and allosaurus are everywhere for size refrences

[sullen cairn]

Although I do question some of his taxonomic assignments

[undone parcel]

i literally have the 2 right beside me let me see

BYU 9024...isnt that the supposed 180 ft Barosaurus

[sullen cairn]

Isn’t that now supersaurus

[undone parcel]

diplodocids annoy me in general

[sullen cairn]

I’m somewhat cautious of the half dozen tooth taxa he calls basal tyrannosauroids

[undone parcel]

he has Austroraptor under paraves

[sullen cairn]

That’s cause unenlagiinae can be kinda finicky

[undone parcel]

pyroraptor and recently Dakotaraptor

[sullen cairn]

Dakotaraptor’s just weird

[undone parcel]

i argue it exists just probably needs more work

[sullen cairn]

Yeah depalma’s just cringe

[undone parcel]

people act like it having afew bits of turtle change much as if this is the first time

[sullen cairn]

It’s cause then someone says the legs are anzu and someone else is like no they’re clearly different but we can’t technically confirm so now everyone’s questioning if it exists

[undone parcel]

whys Siamotyrannus under coelurosauria here...pretty sure its placed as a metriacanthosaur

[sullen cairn]

I think it’s a basal coelurosaur thing but its not very stable

[undone parcel]

he should just go back to doing elephant skeletals...

[sullen cairn]

I just want that ornithischian one to be a thing

[undone parcel]

dacenturia my beloved

[light oxide]

To be honest, why hasn't anyone just went ahead and do a DNA test of--

Oh wait -- I forgot that the individual who found it is . . . pretty secretive about it, for some reason. Unless, of course, my memory is wrong on that part.

[regal schooner]

Permian > mesozoic ( triassic excluded )

[undone parcel]

anteosaurus and gorgonopsians my beloveds

[sullen cairn]

Common depalma L

[light oxide]

Honestly, though, if Dakotaraptor does indeed not exist . . . So what?

The juvenile Tyrannosaurus would've filled its niche anyways, especially since they had a relatively low mortality rate during the juvenile - sub-adult growth, with the hatchlings and somewhat the adults having higher mortality rates.

[sullen cairn]

Because I like the saurian colors

[light oxide]

Fair.

[undone parcel]

i remember when i was younger going to Carnegie when they first put up Anzu as a indeterminate Hell Creek Ceanaghthid

[sullen cairn]

Huh anzu’s almost a decade old now

[undone parcel]

remember when it was the biggest Hell Creek topic at the time

[white matrix]

Yall still discussing sausages? Got hot dog bunnss!))

[sullen cairn]

Cursed hell creek majungasaurine

[undone parcel]

blursed Hell Creek Carnotaurine

[white matrix]

Lmao alr

[sullen cairn]

Okay so like labocania’s an abelisaurid because of temporal diagnosis even though it probably has a better chance at being an allosauroid than that but whatever so what if it liked north and by the time it got to hell creek it was the maastrichtian

[undone parcel]

i thought labocania was a tyrannosaur

[tough parcel]

What, when was Labocania an allosauroid, I've heard abelisaur-tyrannosaur 😭

[woeful falcon]

I too have heard abelisaur tyrannosaur

[sullen cairn]

Prolly tyrannosaur but it’s been called a carcharadontosaur a couple times (namely Mortimer)

[undone parcel]

isnt there a thing of like either we havened found NA abelisaurs or they never made it north due to tyrannosaurs or natural barriers

[sullen cairn]

Abelisaurs aren’t north of Brazil period so who knows

[undone parcel]

remember when Pods travels implied Tarascosaurus was dwarf Arcovenator

[sullen cairn]

Tarascosaurus is an abelisaur that exists and nobody should touch its phylogeny with a ten foot pole

[undone parcel]

isnt it just like a single leg bone

[sullen cairn]

And some verts from another specimen

[undone parcel]

so i guess its reasonably safe probably unless david peters comes along

[sullen cairn]

It’s an abelisaur of some form that doesn’t seem to be particularly close to arcovenator

[undone parcel]

i just know arcos french

[sullen cairn]

There’s also la boucharde and porcieux or whoever you spell it

[undone parcel]

france has untapped potential

[sullen cairn]

France also has the weird maastrichtian maybe small carch maxilla I can’t find anything about

[sacred whale]

https://tenor.com/view/land-of-the-lost-allosaurus-tyrannosaurus-rex-fighting-argument-gif-17281592

[undone parcel]

grumpy and...Alice?

[sacred whale]

Accurate dinosaurs

[undone parcel]

far from it

[sacred whale]

Its a joke….

[undone parcel]

im aware

[astral kelp]

lythronax has a cool name

[undone parcel]

the gore king

Teratophoneus also has one as The Monstrous Murderer

[sullen cairn]

Lythronax is competing with teratophoneus bistahieversor dynamoterror and thanatotheristees for “edgy eutyrannosaurian name” from the past 15 years

[undone parcel]

THE BISTI BEAST

im contractually obligated to yell that when Bisti is mentioned

[sullen cairn]

Of those Lythronax is also probably the smallest so it looses points in the edgy department for that

[undone parcel]

to be fair isnt it also the earliest of them

[sullen cairn]

Yeah
Thanatotheristes is also smaller but wasn’t fully grown

[undone parcel]

so size wasnt fully acheived yet

[sullen cairn]

It’s pretty much daspletosaurus so likely yes

[undone parcel]

daspletosaurus is hell

[sullen cairn]

It’s cool though

[undone parcel]

now that D. wilsoni is official its so weird going back and seeing old D. sp on things

[sullen cairn]

Even then there still is some D. sp

[undone parcel]

people thought albertosaurus was everywhere but it was actually Das

[white matrix]

Yall still at those sausages? Hot dogs are done yet?

Lmao 😭😭 i love me some abelisaurs

[sullen cairn]

A sausage named Pete iii

[astral kelp]

a sausage named majungasaurus (it literally was one)

[sullen cairn]

a sausage named majungatholus

[undone parcel]

nah thats a pachycephalosaur

[white matrix]

💀💀

[sullen cairn]

what being a cranial fragment does to a mf

[undone parcel]

pretty sure at one point pachy was a troodont due to the weird and scary teeth

[sullen cairn]

yep

before then they thought it was a lizard

[woeful falcon]

everything is megalosaurus

[sullen cairn]

everything described before like 1910 enjoyed a brief tenure as megalosaurus

[undone parcel]

counterpoint everythings iguanodon

[woeful falcon]

everything that isn't megalosaurus is iguanodon mhm mhm

[undone parcel]

then theres Hyleasaurus the sad and forgoten third child

[sullen cairn]

theropoda = megalosaurus spp.

[undone parcel]

how many Megalosaurus wastebasket taxa even still remain...i know theres "M." ingens

[sullen cairn]

dunkeri ingens pannoniensis hungaricus chubutensis tibetensis off my head but theres a lot more

[undone parcel]

Megalo will persist till we die

[sullen cairn]

yeah they're all teeth so nobody's in much of a rush to do anything else with them

[undone parcel]

not like teeth are diagnostic enough

its like i hear ingens might jusr be a african allo and im not sure but with allo being literaslly everywhere for it not to be in Africa is not right

[sullen cairn]

ingens is a megalosaurid last time I checked

[undone parcel]

then probably torvo or torvo like

[sullen cairn]

yeah it's either that or a carcharadontosaurid
people seem to lean more towards megalosaurid from what I've seen

[undone parcel]

i just realized that torvo and allo are always together it seems

[covert lintel]

it was more like troodon was considered a pachycephalosaur, iirc. maybe "pachycephalosaur" wasnt the term used but troodon was considered to look Like That

[sullen cairn]

pachycephalosauridae was called troodontidae for a bit it was this whole thing

[undone parcel]

pachycephalosaurs aree just scary...

[sullen cairn]

yeah the US portugal tanzania and maybe uruguay have lots of overlapping fauana

[undone parcel]

portugal wins cause mirigaia is better then stegosaurus and hesperosaurus

then again theres debate if stego is in portugal

[sullen cairn]

still probably no miragaia in America

[undone parcel]

uhh alcovasaurus? is it a dacenturid

[sullen cairn]

yeah but the material's kinda gone so it's a bit of a mess

but it seems to be a miragaia thing

[fair pebble]

What do you guys think about the paleo accurate Spinosaurus

[light osprey]

I like the nighttime one

[nocturne gazelle]

That first pic is so nice

[viscid surge]

I dont even consider any spino paleo-accurate anymore, it changes so fast i just see “wow nice art”. First and second are really nice (diver and fluffy)

[nocturne gazelle]

Fluffy spoon looks so cursed to me, but yea spoon art is usually outdated in a year or so. We still haven't even gotten that spino arm paper yet right?

[viscid surge]

Hey dont ask me i have very basic understanding of what you guys do over in this channel

[nocturne gazelle]

Fair enough, I'm mostly in that boat too since I'm usually providing questions rather than answers lol.

But yea AFAIK spinos arms haven't even been described yet or at least some of the newest discoveries regarding their arms. I'm pretty certain that spinos current/historical arms are theoretical based off suchomimus? But I may be misremembering.

[sullen cairn]

we technically have arm elements from spinosaurus through a humerus and an ulna respectively

humerus gets funny sizes scaled to some older skeletals

[viscid surge]

What does this mean for spino reconstructions and pretty art?

[sullen cairn]

not much because neither of those have associated material

[viscid surge]

Ah

[storm heron]

We also have a single phalange iirc. Also, I am not sure we have actually discovered any new arms from Spinosaurus (I seen this thrown around a lot without any direct proof),

From what I see, it seems to be an assumption that from the undesrcibed material of Spinosaurus, that more arm bones were part of it.

Otherwise, do correct me if I am wrong.

[woeful falcon]

What are its inaccuracies

Or rather, what are Alex's comments on it

[astral kelp]

don't remember exactly but he mentioned quite some things regarding how the head shape was too entelodont like

[woeful falcon]

In what way though exactly bc like, I don't imagine duck changed it much to it's skull. It's the only thing we have of it isn't it

That said, I imagine duck did that bc it clades close to them

[astral kelp]

I'd provide a screenshot of what he said but problem is he said it in a public game discord server which got deleted due to toxicity.

[woeful falcon]

Well this got me no where

[lavish frigate]

Love most of them although I fundamentally disagree with floofy spino

[clever sable]

How about abelisaur Alberto

[lavish frigate]

Don’t remind me…..

It vanished 🎉🍾

[astral kelp]

So I asked him on twitter and I mean tbf that is a valid reconstruction since we only have a skull. It's just that we only have a skull so there currently is no way to make a truly accurate andrew but he said the entelodont-like (as in this isn't very likely) compared to the hippo/anthracothere like hippo is more possible

[woeful falcon]

Why's that if its not even in whippomorpha let alone comparable to an anthracothere

Different phylogenetic analysis?

[astral kelp]

With what little remains we have it is hard to make a set in stone judgement with it's relations since it's skull shows similarities but also notable differences with other ungulates. Although Helohyids seem to have a very similar skull.

search up "Achaenodon" if you don't know what helohyids are btw.

[woeful falcon]

So its just different phylogenetic analysis then

[astral kelp]

It's mostly just an observation some people have made. Theyve said the similarities are the eye socket placement and shape, cheekbones, teeth, sagittal crest, and cranial bone shape.

[fallow citrus]

how large would an average bull sperm whale be?

[clever sable]

Like 40-50 tonnes iirc

[fallow citrus]

ooh okay, thank you

[light oxide]

"A semi-aquatic Didelphodon climbing up on the horn of a Triceratops deceased from a flash flood." - Gabriel N. U., the artist

[light osprey]

Sussy background Azdarchids

[ancient crystal]

Potentially stupid question, but would theropod dinosaurs have crops like modern day birds?

[gentle kite]

Guys, please help me. What does this mean?

[tough parcel]

#launcher-help

[sullen cairn]

probably not considering they appear absent in enantiornithines

crops presumably first evolved in early ornithurans

[lime fulcrum]

What if some sauropods were essentially like reverse white sharks with their coloration? They have lighter or white colors on top, since it's speculated some of them lived in hot and arid environments, and a darker belly so that animals can have a better warning when they are directly under one. Idk if this has been thought of but I just thought it was a cool retrospective

On top of this, they wouldn't really have a reason to hide, so having most of the body be brightly colored would make sense for the animals survival

[bright veldt]

Darker coloration protects from UV rays, and brighter colorations and body patterns are hard to produce in large quantities in larger animals. It's why elephants and most other large animals are solid grays/browns.

[light oxide]

Essentially, the coloration will be darker on the top and lighter on the bottom -- helps against the constant sun shining on them since they're most likely as big as the trees around them anyways. XD

[astral kelp]

what evidence do we have that supports paraentelodon being more omnivorus than other entelodonts? is it the tooth enamel?

[astral kelp]

is it because paraentelodon have high-crowned teeth? which iirc lacks certain tooth folds.

But I also heard it has similar features as other ruminant-like species from Asia in the Oligocene and early Miocene.

[light osprey]

Sounds sus

[light oxide]

Found someone who actually did a bit of muscularity of some of the dinosaurs:

[clever sable]

It would be pretty cool if someone made one of these for a certain pholidosaur

[astral kelp]

matt dempsey makes them

[sullen cairn]

this tenonto's better btw

[light osprey]

Huh, interesting

[clever sable]

So uh, does anyone know where a thing about the skull dimensions of terminonaris? Or just have the numbers themselves? I've been looking for it for a while but I can't find it (skull width is what I'm looking for specifically)

[sullen cairn]

~120cm long and ~43cm wide for big bert

[stiff osprey]

Incredibly rare case of correct scalebar

[clever sable]

Oh thanks

[clever sable]

Was just reading through a paper about that lol, I actually literally just posted this image like 2 seconds ago, now I just gotta find the HW of sarcosuchus somewhere

[clever sable]

Comparison between 2 different sarcosuchus estimates ( credit to @chilly knot and @stiff osprey ) they are 10.13m and 9m respectively

It's a little rough but whatever

[storm heron]

Aren't these two silhouttes different from each other proportionally?

[white matrix]

Is the polar bear in the top 5 largest mammalian land predators

[heady thunder]

Probs

[white matrix]

Cave bear probably 2nd or 3rd

[astral kelp]

I know paraentelodon is the largest mammalian land carnivore at 1300 kg.

[white matrix]

So Andrew is second biggest then 3rd is cave bear?

[white matrix]

Cave bear was like 14 feet tall right?

[astral kelp]

Andrew was a contender but iirc it lost its title but there isn't much you can get frm andrew when all we have is a skull

[white matrix]

THEY FINALLY REDUCED THE COOL DOWN BY LIKE 20 SECONDS OH MY GOSH THANK YOU MODS

[white matrix]

Is third cave bear

And is fifth polar bear

[astral kelp]

pretty sure arctotherium would be second I guess

[white matrix]

What is the largest land mammal

[astral kelp]

Although you can get 2000kg paraentelodon specimens using tooth scaling but I wouldn't recommend it because well its tooth scaling

[astral kelp]

Paraentelodon

[white matrix]

Hmmm. I'm pretty sure Elephants weigh more

[fallow citrus]

paleoloxodon is the largest iirc

[clever sable]

Palaeoloxodon but that's based on a single fragmentary bone

[astral kelp]

Sorry read it as carnivore mb 😭

But yeah it would be paleoloxodon but iirc thats based on femur/tibia scaling

[white matrix]

Yeah if we going mammal indefinite then it's Elephant

[clever sable]

Palaeoloxodon

[white matrix]

African Bush Elephants weigh 13,000 pounds.

[clever sable]

Palaeoloxodon could weigh up to 22 tonnes based on this fragmentary femur

[white matrix]

That's just off a femur.

[clever sable]

There are many mammals that have existed in the past that are larger than African bush elephants

[astral kelp]

Paraentelodon aff. intermedium and Archaeotherium mortoni by Alex james

[white matrix]

Again just a femur

[clever sable]

paraceratherium for one

[clever sable]

African bush elephant isn't even in the top 10 largest land mammals iirc

[white matrix]

It looks like a cow and a giraffe mated then the baby came out more giraffe than cow.

[clever sable]

It's closest living relatives are rhinos

[white matrix]

That ain't paraceratherium that's a Girow

[white matrix]

Then where are it's horns?
And yep a cow and giraffe had babies.

[white matrix]

Is polar bear top 5 tho

I guarantee we killed one of these things during the ice age.

[white matrix]

I killed four

[clever sable]

Nope, it existed way before early humans

[astral kelp]

for anyone wondering whats under its jaw its basically the same vein as some oreodonts, warthogs and forest hogs, both of which also have sexually dimorphic wart-like structures

[clever sable]

Aren't those guys actually closer to hippos?

[clever sable]

Hell pig, more like hell hippo

[clever sable]

Yes...... It's based on 2 different estimates

[astral kelp]

Seems entelodonts also likely face bit

[clever sable]

But anyways, if you could choose one species to bring back (specific species must be listed so you can't say trike or something) what would you bring back a population of?

[astral kelp]

Paraentelodon

[cloud dagger]

Prolibytherium

[covert lintel]

ectopistes migratorius

[lavish frigate]

In this scenario would current oxygen levels climate and other stuff heavily affect said creatures?

[tiny holly]

nope, oxygen levels wouldn't have any impact now and didn't then

main thing to account for in terms of climate would just be temperature but you can probably address that by just putting the population in a climate suited for them. Atmospheric composition wouldn't matter (not even for invertebrates)

[bright veldt]

Eh for invertebrates it might but it’s half n half.

[tiny holly]

There were plenty of big invertebrates even during the permian when oxygen levels were lower, so it probably didn't contribute anywhere near as much as we first thought (and doesnt matter at all for vertebrates, we're good at this whole breathing thing)

[covert lintel]

in terms of the sizes of prehistoric invertebrates, arthopleura is an outlier adn should not have been counted

[willow hemlock]

I'd like to pose a question, just how ancestral are feathers? I personally subscribe to the idea that the pyconfibers of Pterosaurs are a kind of feather, which would make feathers an ancestral trait to all of Ornithodira, or perhaps even all of Avemetatarsalia. I'm interested to hear other's thoughts on the matter though.

[stiff osprey]

I also think feathers are basal to Ornithodira. I don't think they're basal to Avemetatarsalia, though, because the first avems had osteoderms and that feels weird to have both things

[tiny holly]

It does seem quite likely that it's ancestral to pterosaurs + dinosaurs at least, though not archosaurs as a whole. Not only do pterosaurs have pycnofibers very similar to typical "primitive" feathers, there are even pterosaurs with more complex branching integument iirc

[bright veldt]

There have been filament like structures recovered in crocodilians though (embryos specifically).

[covert lintel]

's hard to say for sure where feathers first popped up, but personally i think they're at least basal to ornithodira. some pterosaur pycnofibres very closely resemble simple branching feathers, and i'm of the opinion that they're approximately the same thing

[willow hemlock]

You would be refering to Aphanosaurs correct? Unless I'm forgeting about some other basal Avemetatarsalian. I've seen some depictions of the Aphanosaurs with fuzz, I will admit, it does look rather strange, but I don't think it would be entirely out of the question.

[stiff osprey]

I tried to read that paper, but it's pure genetics jargon, the part discussing evolution is really short and vague. So I have no idea what's going on with crocs

And yes, aphanosaurs have osteoderms

[elfin pulsar]

The one on the right is scarier tho fr

[light osprey]

Oh?

[heady thunder]

https://tenor.com/view/hefelloff-gif-25049370

[viscid surge]

Passenger pigeon, ectopistes migratorius because we wiped them out

[white matrix]

Id pet them ngl

[blissful crescent]

k so I was digging through my room and I found this spinosaurs tooth that my mum bought for me years ago.

I think its a juveniles judging by its size but idk

any thoughts?

sry not best quail

[white matrix]

Def a spoon toofer but they had diff size teefers so its a 50/50 guess imo

[viscid surge]

I know nothing about spinosaur ID but of course i think some rough measurements should help others 👍

[light osprey]

Nah, teeth are definitely diagnostic, it’s a new Spinosaurid genus 👍

[white matrix]

100% a spinosaurid toofer

[blissful crescent]

alr thx guys

[white matrix]

Did spino go extinct before the asteroid impact

[clever sable]

Long Before the impact

[white matrix]

Big sad

[ancient crystal]

From what I recall spino went extinct with the entire spinosauridae lineage. It was the last, and the most confusing.

[light osprey]

Montanaspinus 😔

[bright veldt]

Carnosaurs as a whole died out in the series of extinction events that occurred between 90 and 85 million years ago. A lot of groups did.

[clever sable]

What major theropod groups were still around by the KT extinction?

[bright veldt]

Tyrannosauroids and Abelisaurs basically, if ur only talking about the big predatory ones. There’s plenty of others.

[clever sable]

Abelisaurs were very good at what they did, I don't know much about them but it seems they were able to stick around through most if not all of the cretaceous and thrive in every environment

[sullen cairn]

you also have the various post-cenomanian teeth assigned to carcharadontosauridae that totally won't be reassigned to abelisauridae and maybe unquillosaurus in the campanian and sudan being weird with that maybe campanian-maastrichtian thing with carcharadontosaurids

[bright veldt]

Doubt

[light osprey]

Africa is pretty weird 🤷‍♂️

[sullen cairn]

africa might have a megaraptoran too which is neat

[light osprey]

Bahariasaurus

[sullen cairn]

nah it's some vertebrae in tanzania

[light osprey]

[sullen cairn]

What we really need is more cases of ecosystems where abelisaurids would be stomping megaraptorans because it'd be cool

[light osprey]

Hym

[honest wave]

Megaraptorans have no excuse to fossilize as poorly as they do, the absolute audacity

[sullen cairn]

and yet somehow multiple megaraptorid genera have more specimens or referred material than any south american abelisaurids

[compact leaf]

we also don’t have maastrichtian rock in a few big areas so it wouldn’t be entirely shocking if a few carnosaur lineages persisted, in most places they definitely died out but there’s those weird places they could still be

not necessarily a huge chance but there is a chance

[sullen cairn]

there are bits and pieces that might be carcharadontosaurids but they're fragmentary and almost all teeth

[compact leaf]

gotta love non-diagnostic teeth

[sullen cairn]

and that stupid maxillary fragment that got reassigned to abelisauridae

[stiff osprey]

if there is a relict maastrichtian carcharodontosaur it's gotta be in like central america

every other continent has giant megaraptorans, giant abelisaurs or giant tyrannosaurids in their place

this is exactly what we almost got with labocania, though it's now generally assumed to be a tyrannosaur

[compact leaf]

northern europe is also a possibility it has some strangeness and stayed mostly isolated from the maastrichtian europe stuff we have, south africa probably doesn’t have carcharodontosaurs but who knows what’s going on down there, central africa is just a weird spot overall too

[sullen cairn]

there's this potential weirdo in europe that'd be like 4m but the only two things making any reference to its existance aren't online

and then there's teeth in brazil assigned to carcharadontosauridae in um.... 2006

[stiff osprey]

yeah those definitely didn't become abelisaurs along with all the other carcharodontosaurid teeth that became abelisaurs in 2016

[light osprey]

What’s in Central America anyways

[sullen cairn]

was there a 2016 one cause I only know about the 2021 one
poor allosauroids

[stiff osprey]

hadrosaurs and titanosaurs and.... presumably something to eat them

[slender path]

Why was Adolescent and now I'm juvenile and I did not die, I have no idea what happened

[light osprey]

Mmm, Tyrannosaurs?

[frail robin]

Troodon is my favourite dinosaur

[sullen cairn]

probably tyrannosaurs considering at least parts of northern central america seems to have been close to mexico even in the cretaceous

And we don't seem to find abelisaurids north of Brazil. Although we don't really find anything north of Brazil in South America period.

Granted our total tyrannosaur record in mexico amounts to random teeth and potentially labocania

[light osprey]

Sounds good enough for me

[sullen cairn]

our total central american dinosaur record amounts to like a metatarsal a femur

[light osprey]

The tropics are just lovely aren’t they

[compact leaf]

god only knows what’s going on in central africa

[light osprey]

Dinosaurs for sure

Maybe some Pteranodontids to quench my thirst 👹

[sullen cairn]

hmmmm

[light osprey]

🥱too fragmentary no one cares about it

[sullen cairn]

😦

femur seems to be from a little guy

~2ish meter total length

[light osprey]

Oh wow, that’s actually little

[clever sable]

What happened to your dinosaur of the day thing?

Lmfao

[pearl briar]

Dunkleosteus in nutshell: deadly chonky fish

[small temple]

Didn’t a recent study said that the Dunk was actually a fairly smol fsh?

[pearl briar]

well they are

[nocturne gazelle]

They got hit with a downsize. Along with leed iirc. Meanwhile meg got bigger.

[small temple]

Yeah, that’s what I’m saying because before this was the standard size of the Dunk, so now that they basically got nerfed into being a small boi, it’s very funny to see

[nocturne gazelle]

I've heard prehistoric wildlife isn't a very good source but I've never heard why.

Tbh I kinda like new dunk better. Funny round chomper

[woeful falcon]

History of being less than reliable vs other resources of the same animals

[small temple]

I’ve heard of that too, I just used this pic because it was what was first when I googled the Dunk size(and I’m lazy), also ngl me too, a round chonky chomper fish is oddly adorable

[clever sable]

This is the kind info they have

[bright veldt]

Spreading fire is a speculative behavior, but you have to keep in mind that all it is. There's no founding on it whats' o' ever outside of the fact that other theropods (3 of the around 100 bird of prey species that exist, nevermind of the 10,000 bird species) do it. Which is fine, but you can pit this behavior on any smaller theropod and it would make just as much sense.

@white matrix

[white matrix]

Did you end up catching my message in the other chat? Or?

[drifting bear]

Good evening

[bright veldt]

I only managed to catch something broadly about troodontid intelligence, which doesn't work either because troodontids being really intelligent by dinosaur standards isn't really true, at least from how we understand it. Intelligence is an incredibly hard thing to quantify, and it's an incredibly controversial field even in modern animals that we can directly observe rather than just look at bones. Troodontids were originally considered super-smart cause of their brain to body ratio, which is now known to be inconsistent and doesn't really tell you anything. Yeah this works for elephants, cetaceans, and primates, but there's no garuntee that this applies across various clades that all are hard-wired very differently. Look at crows for example. Their porportional brain size is about average for a bird yet everyone talks about how smart they are. This also doesn't go over how the intelligence of reptiles is heavily underestimated and they're likely smarter than we think. If this was actually never about this then I apologize but I hope it was at least fun to read.

There have been attempts at quantifying dinosaur intelligence in other ways (looking at neural density rather than brain size) but it's a very fishy and uncertain line of work as well.

[white matrix]

I mentioned their intelligence measured by the size of their brain, mixed with them being found in areas likely to be more prone to bushfires and such - which is something they have in common with particular species' of bird that exhibit this behaviour.

But yeah i'm not trying to pedal it as a definitive fact or defending it to the death or anything, i was just trying to explain why it's a theory to begin with. I just accidentally presented it as a fact and made people mad(?) 'cos i assumed people just automatically take most talk about prehistory as theory. q:

[bright veldt]

It's all good. Just really wanted to clarify about the process of it all.

[white matrix]

Yeah i getchu

[bright veldt]

Which reminds me, if you want an idea about how well we can deduce the lifestyles of some prehistoric animals. Look at plesiosaurs, especially the non-pliosaur variety where this has been researched the most. We know from fossils that their newborne babies, compared to their parents were huge (about 1/3 the mother's body size). They only had one offspring at a time, and these babies were pretty poor swimmers, making them pretty defenseless. It is such an investment that not only does it almost certainly confirm that these animals showed parental care, but also likely lived in family units in order to properly compensate for rearing the young in this way. It's often been compared to cetaceans like dolphins in how they would've lived in pods n' such. While probably not to dolphin-levels, this likely would've required sophisticated social behaviors. More than their otherwise tiny heads and brains would suggest anyway.

It's not well-researched in the more brutish types like liopleurodon and kronosaurus, but them being similar is not off the plate as well, which is kind of horrifying to think about. If uncertain.

[nocturne gazelle]

Aquatics: Born poor swimmers

Meanwhile baby horses: ZOOM

[white matrix]

I feel like the argument could be made that parental and pod bahaviour are due to instinct, rather than intelligence? - but idk enough to actually back that.

[nocturne gazelle]

How did plesiosaurs defend themselves? Were they fast? Biggest around? Nippy? Just pod tactics?

[bright veldt]

That's the thing. It goes back to how we classify intelligence, which is a whole thing that I'd rather not get into further. I guess one way of looking at it is instinctual learning versus mechanical learning and culture. But I only thought that off the top of my head just now.

[white matrix]

Yeah i see

[bright veldt]

I wouldn't be surprised if being able to back each other up in large groups was how they got away with having those super vulnerable long necks (on top of their bites actually being very powerful, more than what you'd expect coming from those tiny heads).

[nocturne gazelle]

Oh they did have powerful bites?

[bright veldt]

oh yeah, look at these muscle attachments