RE: Regarding Spinosaurus

["Williams, Tim" <TiJaWi@agron.iastate.edu>]

Aspidel wrote:

>I'd better imagine this fat storage for LTr _Coelophysis_ or deep south
>taxa like _Cryolophosaurus_.


Where do camels live today?  Is it mere coincidence that the camel currently
lives in the same part of the world once occupied by tall-spined spinosaurs,
ouranosaurs and sauropods?  To be honest, I don't know - but it's worth
thinking about.

Anyway, if (and I stress *if*) spinosaurids were scavengers, then it might
make sense to store as much fat as possible.  Many vultures are
gobble-and-go scavengers - they sometimes eat so much that they can't take
off, and have a capacious crop to store the food.  This is because
scavengers have to rely on something else doing their killing for them -
predators, disease, old age - and so they have to make the best of a very
unpredictable food source.  Since the preferred choice of food of scavengers
is carrion, it may be a long wait between meals.  When times are good for
everyone else, they're bad for scavengers - at least those who lack the
equipment or impulse to attack live prey.

Having said that, I think spinosaurs had thermoregulatory sails, not adipose
humps.  As for _Acrocanthosaurus_ (maybe), _Metriacanthosaurus_, and
_Altispinax_ (which is apparently the correct genus name after all), I
prefer to restore them with humps.



Tim