more on CURSORIAL STEGOSAURS?

[<darren.naish@port.ac.uk>]

On stegosaur feet, George wrote...

> Metatarsal V was likely present in all known stegosaurs as 
> the usual dinosaurian splint or vestige [...snip...] This small, loosely
> articulated bone is easily lost before fossilization, which is why we
> see it only rarely, in the best-preserved dinosaur feet.

Does anyone know if a vestigial mt V (apologies for my earlier 
confusion) is present in the other articulated _Stegosaurus_ specimens 
(e.g. the Small and Carpenter skeleton at Denver)?

While George's case is logical, I'd still like to know what that French 
trackway belongs to: as I said before, if it _is_ a primitive stegosaur it 
suggests graviportality and quadrupedalism first, digit reduction in the 
pes later. IIRC this animal had pentadactyl hands. As for unsual 
patterns of digit loss in quadrupedal animals, there are various 
examples of groups evolving a 'reduced' foot while the manus does not 
undergo the same reduction - e.g. some notoungulates evolved two-
toed hindfeet but retained three manual digits, some agamids have 
tridactyl feet but pentadactyl hands. I will admit that these animals are 
not graviportal archosaurs though.

BTW, I walked into Dave Martill's office this morning and found 
Oliver Wings.

DARREN NAISH 
PALAEOBIOLOGY RESEARCH GROUP
School of Earth & Environmental Sciences
UNIVERSITY OF PORTSMOUTH
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