week 6

Question 1

weapons are firstly weapons, but what other purpose may they serve?

Answer 1

deterrents, agonistic behaviour, ornate features for mates, etc

Question 2

large dinos didn’t have armour or anything like that. how did they defend themselves?

Answer 2

large size in itself is a defense. it makes u hard to eat, and also u can step on people

Question 3

are cursorial limbs more suited towards predator or prey?

Answer 3

both take advantage of it quite well (catch prey/avoid predator)

Question 4

what is crypsis? what are some listed examples?

Answer 4

crypsis is the ability of an animal to avoid detection

most well known is camo, but also there’s scent masking chemicals and hiding behaviours

Question 5

what is finite element analysis?

Answer 5

a technique used to evaluate hypotheses about the functions of dino adaptations

computer sims that apply a set of material properties to a digital object to observe how stress disperses

ex. really useful when looking at ankylosaurs, THOUGH WE CANNOT CONFIRM ANYTHING

Question 6

what were the eye placements of the predator vs prey like?

Answer 6

prey: on the side of the head (way bigger field of view to detect predators)

predator: stereoscopic, where field of view overlapped (good depth perception)

Question 7

what is the diff bw ambush predators and stalk/pursue predators?

Answer 7

ambush lie in wait for a prey to come, stalk/pursue hunt their prey down

Question 8

what dinos were found at dry island buffalo jump prov park? what was significant about this discovery?

Answer 8

a group of some 20 albertasaurus were found, possibly suggesting sociality (NOT confirmed though - could all have stumbled across a prey and then got fucked by a flood)

Question 9

what did the fighting fossil demonstrate?

Answer 9

hunting in real time
- velociraptor sickle at the throat of proceratops
- proceratops defending itself

Question 10

what is intraspecific behav?

Answer 10

interactions within the same species
common due to competing for space, mates, food, etc

Question 11

what is agonistic behaviour?

Answer 11

aggressive intraspecific behaviour (ex. pachycephalosaurs were thought to butt heads)

Question 12

a large group of prey are relatively easy to spot. why would they continue to engage in this behaviour?

Answer 12

• more prey = more eyes to spot predators
• more prey = decr likelihood that u get caught (1 vs 1000 indivs yk)

Question 13

what are monospecific bonebeds? why are they significant?

Answer 13

monospecific bone beds are tracks of one species of dino. this is weird bc a healthy ecosystem should have many footprints –> mono- bonebeds may suggest herd movement

Question 14

ankylosaurs were found in monospecific bonebeds in china. what was interesting about this?

Answer 14

juveniles were found together without armor, while adults are rarely found together. may suggest that juveniles stuck together while osteoderms/bone clubs developed

Question 15

many trex skulls have been found with partially healed injuries. thoughts?

Answer 15

we know they must have been nonlethal bite marks bc they partially healed
social behaviour!

Question 16

triceratops skulls are found with a significantly high amount of injuries on the squamosal bone, which matches the approximate length of the horn. thoughts?

Answer 16

defense mechanism (horns) was likely coopted for agonistic behaviour

Question 17

we look at euplocephalus (an ankylosaur) to figure out the purpose of the tail club. what questions would we have to ask if we thought it was for defensive purposes? what did we determine?

Answer 17

• if it was capable of swinging
• how hard it could be swung
• would it break if it hit something

WE CANNOT DETERMINE that it used it for swinging - however, from the evidence we gathered (using FEA) we can determine that it could swing its tail club relatively hard

Question 18

what is the difference between a stalking predator and a pursuit predator?

Answer 18

stalking: sneak and get close, then pounce

pursuit: persistently follow prey until its exhausted

Question 19

what are the benefits/problems of pack hunting?

Answer 19

+ easier to surround prey
+ take on bigger/more dangerous prey
- need to split up food bw more members

Question 20

pachycephalosaurs are thought to have smacked heads in intraspecific behav. does this guarantee headbutt theory?

Answer 20

headbutt theory suggests that, similar to modern animal such as musk oxen, pachy- headbutt to establish dominance etc.

we have to ask:
- were domes strong enough to withstand headbutting
- would impacts damage the brain
- are there similar physiologies in modern animals that do the same behav that could help us?

pachy- could have withstood the impacts relatively unscathed, and had similar cushioning elements that would protect the brain

DOES NOT CONFIRM but proves it may have been possible