Re: BURROWING ARCHOSAURS

[franczak@ntplx.net (Brian Franczak)]

Darren Naish wrote:

> Only one dinosaur, to my knowledge, has ever been regarded as a burrower,
>but > all I have to go on is a brief bit of blurb Bakker came out with on
>a TV show > broadcast in 1993. The crew were filming in his house, and in
>his sink were a > load of alligator legs, with a hypsilophodontid tarsus
>and foot on the        > drainage board. He said, and I am sure of this,
>that this hypsilophodontid    > represented the first evidence for a
>dinosaur 'that lived in a burrow'. A     > little later I thought he might
>be referring to _Drinker_, but in everything  > else Bakker has written
>about _Drinker_  he maintains that it was a marsh-    > dweller adapted
>for walking around on wet ground. Not the right habitat to dig > burrows.

Of course, Bakker also thinks _Utahraptor_ was a burrow-dweller (see RAPTOR
RED), so I think his comments (as usual) need to be taken with a rather
large grain of salt. I have to ask, though, how would an animal (in this
case a hysilophodontid) with a tail stiffened along at least the latter
half of its length be able to live comfortably in a burrow? (I had the same
problem with his _Utahraptor_ scenario.) It would seem to me that a
burrow-dweller would need a bit more body flexibilty than hypsilophodontids
exhibit. Comments?


Brian (franczak@ntplx.net)
http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Launchpad/2045/