Re: FW: The ground-nowhere hypothesis on the origin of bird flight (joke)

[don ohmes <d_ohmes@yahoo.com>]

Hmmm. Perhaps the drop-bear is attracted to camera straps?

More seriously -- mammals need to eat way too often to be able to just sit in a 
tree and wait for something to happen to walk underneath them. There is another 
factor too; most prey is alert enough that missing your initial pounce is 
likely, and if a prey species are slow movers, then actively searching works 
better than waiting anyway. All in all, I think pouncing is highly over-rated, 
at least in today's world.

The local anoles seem to use it w/ success on insects, though, so I think it 
still plays in flight evolution cartoons. 

Humans hunt deer from trees of course, w/ good success, but use projectile 
weapons to greatly increase their killing range as well as various baits, 
scents, and calls. I once calculated the cost of licensing, special clothes, 
weapons, trucks, refrigeration and other accessories and came up w/ a total 
cost 250$US/lb for venison (although assuming 2 deer/year for 10 years, and 10 
years per truck it gets closer to 15$US).

--- On Mon, 10/12/09, Tim Williams <tijawi@yahoo.com> wrote:

> From: Tim Williams <tijawi@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: FW: The ground-nowhere hypothesis on the origin of bird flight 
> (joke)
> To: dinosaur@usc.edu
> Date: Monday, October 12, 2009, 12:11 AM
> 
> 
> Dann Pigdon <dannj@alphalink.com.au>
> wrote:
> 
> 
> > I've seen lots of leopard hunting footage over the
> years,
> > but I've never seen a leopard leap onto 
> > prey from above.
> 
> 
> I'm sure there are other examples, but the only mammal I
> can think of that leaps out trees to attack prey on the
> ground is the drop-bear of Australia.  British and
> Japanese tourists are its preferred prey.
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drop_bear
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Cheers
> 
> Tim
> 
> 
>       
>