Re: The Killers of Oz

what about the arctic? surely it has poor soil yet the largest land carnivore around in the polar bear. It also has the artic fox. Not bad for a place with little to no vegetation! I think the importance with this idea is the number of herbivores around. You have a lot of prey you will get a lot of carnivores. You have a lot of large prey you will surely get large carnivores.

The soil theroy probably has more to do with poor fossilisation then anything else...something Australia does have a problem with!

Phil Hore

National Dinosaur Museum

Canberra, Australia

ph (02) 62302655

A child was brought into this world. A child of light and innocence. A beautiful child of with talent, grace and integrity. A child to lead us into a glorious future....his name...John Wayne.

I've seen all his movies!

>From: Dann Pigdon <dannj@alphalink.com.au> >Reply-To: dannj@alphalink.com.au >To: DML <dinosaur@usc.edu> >Subject: Re: The Killers of Oz >Date: Mon, 03 May 2004 06:49:49 +1000 > > > >Mark Hallett wrote: > > > > I believe that the "poor soil" hypothesis also is > > questionable in light of palnological evidence showing > > that until mid to late Miocene times, Australia > > apparently had lush forests on a continental scale. > > (Vickers-Rich et al, AUSTRALIA'S LOST WORLD: The > > Prehistoric Animals of Australia) > >Actually, rainforests often have the poorest of soils. Yet they still >manage to support a huge ecological diversity. So soil condition in >itself is not always a good indicator of biodiversity. > >-- >________________________________________________________________ > >Dann! P! ! igdon Australian Dinosaurs: >GIS / Archaeologist http://www.geocities.com/dannsdinosaurs >Melbourne, Australia http://www.alphalink.com.au/~dannj/ >________________________________________________________________