• LouisGarbuor
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    22
    ·
    1 year ago

    Some things I felt I should mention:

    Firstly and most comically: Some sauropods swallowed rocks to aid in digestion, which are called gastroliths. While I only know of diplodocoids (think long and low sauropods) having used gastroliths, Brachiosaurus and other macronarians (tall sauropods, as seen in the picture) might have used them, although I’m not certain on that, as there is some differences in diet between diplodocoids and macronarians. If so, their vomit might have been even more dangerous, although the gastroliths are stored in their own organ iirc. (Just looked it up, there is gastroliths found that probably came from Cedarosaurus, which is a macronarian that was pretty closely related to Brachiosaurus, link: https://fr.copernicus.org/articles/18/1/2015/fr-18-1-2015.pdf)

    Secondly and most nitpicky: The picture shows fairly large dromaeosaurs, which don’t have a record of existing in the Late Jurassic when Brachiosaurus existed. Now, the fossil record is very incomplete, with one estimate putting the known number of Tyrannosaurus rex specimens at about one billionth of the amount that lived over the 3 million years that species was present. But there are no dromaeosaurs that I know of from the Late Jurassic, let alone the Morrison Formation where Brachiosaurus is found, which is one of the best fossil sites for dinosaurs. It isn’t impossible, the split between bird and dromaeosaurs was before the Late Jurassic, but it is highly unlikely, especially in the Morrison, as there were a bunch of predators that would have competed with a large dromaeosaur. Again, this last one is very nitpick-y. Still a funny image though