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Re: hunters in belgum
Tobi,
The whole fossil fauna of an area is never completely preserved,
discovered and recovered because of several things. Firstly, the
process of fossilization preserves hard things selectively. You tend
to find hard things like teeth before you find soft things like
skin. So soft bodied, lightly boned (or no boned) things are less
likely to be fossilized. Secondly, common things are preserved more
often than rare things. For instance, common prey species will be
preserved more often than the few predators that feed on them. The
Belgium Iguanodon was certainly a common prey species and probably
quite numerous. I find many, many prey species teeth versus just a
few carnivore teeth in my digs. (Triceratops teeth are by far the
most common tooth fossil in the upper Cretaceous Hell Creek Formation
at my ranch located in Montana and Wyoming.)
www.wyomingdinosaurs.com Also, prey species often had many teeth
that they constantly shed for new teeth so an individual dinosaur
could shed hundred of teeth over their lifetime.
Since the Wealden strata in Belgium (proper) apparently contain few
widespread dinosaur fossils to begin with, (with the exception of
that 19th century find of 20 iguanodons in the coal mine) there would
be relatively fewer predators species to find. Thirdly, you have the
problem of two moments in time having to cross paths. Your time line
and the fossils time line have to be in the same place at the same
moment. If a dinosaur fossil weathered out 10,000 years ago, you
will not find anything but a pile of bone dust. If it hasn't
weathered out yet, you will not see it even if it is a few inches
below the surface. Most dinosaur material is not found by digging
(pick a site and just start digging), it is found by systematically
walking around and area known for having dinosaur remains and using
your eyes to look for clues. The 5 square miles of "dinosaur
bearing" Hell Creek Formation on my ranch has yielded but only a few
thousand square feet of rich fossil bearing rocks. There is much
much more here, but it is not exposed on the surface, I have not
found it (under a cactus where I haven't looked), or it has already
weathered away and is dust in the wind. Only a relatively small
amount of material is found accidently by digging randomly as by
backhoes on a building project or a mine shaft. I do point out that
some of these accidental finds have been significant and impressive.
Belgium is a small country of about 11000 square mile. The county I
live in (Campbell County, Wyoming) is almost 5000 square miles and
the next county to the east (Crook) is nearly 3000 square miles.
There are fewer dinosaurian fossils in Crook County but many in
Campbell (because of there the dinosaur bearing rocks happen to
outcrop.) I live 4 miles from the border of Crook county. There are
none in the county to the west. It is a matter of coincidence where
the geopolitical boundaries lie with respect to the occurrence of
dinosaur remains. There are theropod (dinosaur predator) fossils from
the Wealden strata outside and around Belgium so there are
representative occurrences nearby.
Keep asking questions, pay your dues and look for clues.
Best
Frank (Rooster) Bliss
MS Biostratigraphy
Weston, Wyoming 82731
www.wyomingdinosaurs.com
On Apr 27, 2007, at 7:54 AM, Tobi Hautekiet wrote:
hallo everybody,
please forgive me for my spelling, i go to a dutch school and am
12. I woold like to ask everybody if there have been any
excavation's in Belgum, i thought not with is werd because there
are iguanodon's(prey) but no hunters found, there must be like
Megalosaurus and baryonix and neoventaor, that is worth digging up no?
thanks for your attention, i hope to get an anwser
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