Re: Amargasaurus...

["David Marjanovic" <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> Consider, for example, the generally accepted scenario:  dinos
> began as carnivores and outcompeted all others, and then, to me
> surprisingly, some of them became herbivores and became dominant in that
> category as well.
> Now that's what I call being a successful generalist!

"Generally accepted scenario"? 20 years ago maybe. People who believe that
dinosaurs outcompeted anything have become very rare.
Ornithischia is as old as Saurischia, and Sauropodomorpha also appeared very
early (think of the ?Middle -- Late Triassic fauna from Madagascar) so there
have been herbivorous dinosaurs practically since the beginning.
At the end of the Triassic the rauisuchians died out. Suddenly theropods
began to grow, judging from footprints. Similar for dicynodonts and
rhynchosaurs vs. herbivorous dinosaurs -- there was a mass extinction that
emptied the niches so that dinosaurs could enter them.