Re: Tyrannosaurus "Scavenger vs. Predator" debate - Some questions for Dr. Jack Horner:

[Phil Bigelow <bigelowp@juno.com>]

On Mon, 23 Feb 2004 10:59:45 -0800 (PST) Mickey Rowe
<rowe@psych.ucsb.edu> writes:
> 
> Phil Bigelow <bigelowp@juno.com> wrote:
> 
> > In the published case, the Triceratops apparently lived long 
> enough
> > after the attack to have its horn bones to partially heal.  The
> > attack failed.  An "almost kill" won't fill a T. rex's belly.
> 
> A couple of points I haven't seen anyone else make...  Point one,
> let's start from the implicit assumptions Phil has been making 
> about
> _Tyrannosaurus_ hunting behavior.  The above could be absolutely 
> correct,
> and the student with the massive travel budget might show that in 
> the
> set of specimens of _Triceratops_ with bite marks on their horns, 
> more
> often than not the bite marks show signs of healing.  Such would
> indicate that for a _Triceratops_, getting a tyrannosaur to grab 
> your
> horns would represent a winning move (irrespective of who started 
> the
> fight).
> 
> Point two, Phil has repeatedly made the claim that there is no 
> upside
> for a tyrannosaur grabbing the horn of a _Triceratops_.  Let's cast
> aside the implicit assumption that Phil is making: that 
> tyrannosaurs
> hunted alone.  Now if *I* were going to try to get a bite through 
> the
> spine of a _Triceratops_, I sure would like it if one of my friends
> were holding onto the horns to make sure *I* didn't have to worry
> about them.  If tyrannosaurs cooperatively hunted, then you might
> expect that most of the times that a tyrannosaur got hold of the 
> horns
> of a _Triceratops_, that animal's fate had been sealed, and the 
> survey
> of horn damage would come out the opposite of what's suggested 
> above,
> more often than not, bite marks would show no sign of healing.
> 
> Seems like a great thesis project because you could write it up
> irrespective of the outcome of your examination provided that you
> could find more than a few bite-marked horns and had some 
> reasonable
> way of inferring whether or not the animal survived the attack.
> 
> -- 
> Mickey Rowe     (rowe@psych.ucsb.edu)
> 


Du'OH! (sound of open hand hitting forehead).  I didn't consider the
possibility of two thugs ganging up on one victim.

Another list member mentioned the possibility that one T. rex could have
used the horns as  leverage so that it could push the Triceratops over
with one of its feet. (hmmmm.....I see a possible study of "foot-edness"
in tyrannosaurs, using the orientation of tooth marks on the horns.  Were
tyrannosaurs left- or right-brain dominant?  Okay, okay, I went WAY too
far with that idea ;-)  ).

Seriously, I agree that it would be a good student project, because even
if it was shown that most T. rex-bitten Triceratops horns didn't have
time to heal, it still would be strong evidence that T. rex was an active
predator. [at the risk of being repetitive, why would a scavenging T. rex
bite the horns of a dead Triceratops?  Horns have little food value,
except for minerals.  A separate study on the taphonomy of modern
Wildebeast kills might also be informative.  How often do Wildebeast
horns show lion and/or hyena tooth marks? Can the horn damage caused by
these two feeders be distinguished?].

<pb>








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