Re: Cooperating theropods?

["Larry Dunn" <larrydunn@hotmail.com>]

From: "Jaime Headden" <jaemei@hotmail.com>
>
>Not when the entire bodies of these *Deinonychus* are found with the 
>*Tenontosaurus*, or that there are three different specimens of 
>dromaeosaurs preying on tenontosaurs. The sedimentology was sufficient 
>only to scatter the remains into diarticulated array, not as would be 
>suggested by a large flood or fast current; That means partial burial 
>before the flood that uprooted blocks of bones and moved them a short 
>distance away.

A flash flood could certainly have drowned the animals in the first 
place and deposited bodies together (or a short disance apart) in mud 
without scattering their remains.  

And we need not necessarily look to flood to determine why the animals 
died together.  Perhaps some volcanic event led to mass death -- and 
these dromaeosaurs were scavenging a carcass when lethal gases 
descended.

I assume that the predation hypothesis suggests a struggle to kill the 
Tenontosaur, with several Deinonychus dying in the process.  

Isn't the patent absurdity of this obvious?  

How often to pack-hunting vertebrates attack a prey animal and lose 
*three* of their number in the process?  They may lose one but that 
would be a fluke.  In the *highly* unlikely event that they accidentally 
attack an animal that is too tough for them (hunting vertebrates tend to 
very carefully choose their prey), they'd certainly back away and cut 
their losses.  The object of the game is to survive, not just to kill.  
Pack hunters just do not attack an animal that will kill multiple pack 
members. 

This hypothesis seems to remove dinosaurs from the realm of reality and 
surrender them to the fantasy of antediluvian "savage monsters" which we 
now know that they certainly were not.  

So unless the Tenontosaur went postal (upset with comments about his 
"big tail") and started hunting Deinonychus, the whole scenario just 
seems counterintuitive to me.

The only other rational explanation I can see is that there was a fight 
at the found carcass (theropods certainly seem to have been rough with 
each other) leading to the deaths of certain animals.

Larry

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