12/16/2023 0 Comments Saurian dakotaraptor cutout![]() ![]() On the other hand digit II is not especially robust in Dromaeosaurus and the remaining unguals look more adapted towards a cursorial lifestyle than grasping. Relatively diminished claw size/strength D. Robust head of Dromaeosaurus albertensis. I mean just check out the skull of this animal, there is nothing slight, superficial, or atrophied about it at all: In Dromaeosaurus albertensis cursorial adaptations are highlighted, the killing claw is relatively atrophied, and the skull is relatively massive and robust (almost tyrannosaurid like as GSP has commented). Additionally there are some notable omissions, most obviously the name sake for the whole family Dromaeosaurus!! While Deinonychus and Velciraptor have relatively short metatarsi I can't see how they interpret the leggy Saurornitholestes as an example of this trend. cite Deinonychus (early Cretaceous), and Velociraptor & Saurornitholestes (late Cretaceous). paper:Īs evidence for the purported trend in increasing foot strength Fowler et al. I will cut and paste the source of this observation from the Fowler et al. In the early Cretaceous Deinonychus we have a relatively sub-cursorial but highly adept foot grasper - again there is a bit of an inverse relationship between foot grasping strength and cursorial ability as I discussed in the first post and which Fowler et al. less cursorial adaptations 2) as firepower is concentrated in the feet for killing the robustness of the skull and teeth should hold steady or potentially diminish. ![]() That over the course of the 100 million year evolutionary trajectory of these animals an increasing reliance on ungual prey capture will 1) show a trend towards shorter and therefore stronger legs i.e. If the use of the "killing claw" digit II was indeed the be all and end all of dromaeosaurid prey capture and feeding technique we should be able to make some predictions to test that assertion. paper on the dromaeosaurid RPR hypothesis: relative to accipterids, the ungual grasping ability of dromaeosaurids was >not as strongnot always<. I reiterated a point seldom mentioned from the Fowler et al. in which prey subequal in size is grasped by all four digits. In my first post I documented the shift in scientific thought on these claws from scythes that cut meter long slashes in prey to crampons that allowed hitching rides on the hides of dinosaurs to ultimately the prevalent modern interpretation of raptor prey restraint (RPR) model of Fowler et al. Readers of this series may have detected a slight yet pervasive diminution of the import of the famed "killing claw" over the course of these posts. So I gave this article a really long title and hope you get something out of it!! Additionally, as I will elaborate on further, the two aspects I will focus in on here - biting & locomotion - are not mutually exclusive and one dovetails into the other. I really thought about splitting this post into two posts for both respective hypotheses, but for the sake of brevity and wrapping this series up I decided to combine them. ![]()
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