Re: Spinosaurs ate pterosaurs

[Tim Williams <twilliams_alpha@hotmail.com>]

David Marjanovic wrote:

> Had it been a parachuter, it would have had to climb back up the height of
> the entire tree each time it had caught one insect. Less efficient even 
> than
> jumping up from the ground, right?

I suppose that depends on the rate of success.  Admittedly, no modern animal 
that I know of catches insects by leaping from the ground into the air, or 
by snatching them mid-air while parachuting or gliding.  The birds and bats 
that do this are powered fliers and have excellent maneuverability.

> Still I'd say that the short head is a juvenile feature, fitting others in
> the same specimen, and that the long 3rd finger argues for a different
> ecological niche anyway.

I think you're alluding to the hypothesis that _Epidendrosaurus_ stuck its 
extra-long finger into deep and narrow holes in trees to extract grubs - in 
the same fashion as the modern aye-aye (_Daubentonia_) of Masagsacar and the 
striped possums (_Dactylopsila_ and _Dactylonax_) of Australia and New 
Guinea.  The aye-aye has the third finger elongated, whereas in the striped 
possums it is the fourth finger that is the longest (especially in 
_Dactylonax_).


Paul Sparks wrote:

> I I'd think that it would be even more difficult for a fish to spit at a 
> bug
> in a tree as their primary scheme to feed, but there is a medium size fish
> in Brazil that does just that very effeciently.

I know archer fishes (Toxotidae) do this.  I've also heard that they prefer 
to leap out of the water to snatch the prey with their jaws when the prey is 
close enough to the water surface, and only "spit" if the prey is too far, 
or they miss with the leap.  The prey is actually sitting on overhanging 
vegetation at the time, and thus immobile when the fish makes its strike.



Tim

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