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Post by Horridus on May 10, 2011 16:58:01 GMT
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Post by Griffin on May 10, 2011 19:56:21 GMT
What a weird looking juvenile!
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Post by sid on May 11, 2011 8:57:41 GMT
The more i read about it, the more i'm persuaded "Raptorex" is just another baby Tarbo, and Peter Larson is right.
Oh, and if, as the study says, young Tarbos had the same number of teeth of the adults, and considering tarbo is VERY close to T.rex, this could mean that Nano-T is really a valid genus... Or maybe Jane and the other supposed Nano-T specimen are juveniles of a still unidentified Albertosaurinae living alongside Rexy.
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Post by Horridus on May 11, 2011 16:50:44 GMT
It would be a tyrannosaurine, not an albertosaurine, wouldn't it? In which case there would be another large tyrannosaurine (as 'Jane' and the Nanotyrannus type specimen are juveniles) living alongside T. rex that hasn't been found yet (or rather, adults of which haven't been found yet).
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Post by sid on May 11, 2011 18:14:00 GMT
I said "Albertosaurinae" mainly due to the pronounced lacrimal hornlets of both Jane and the original Nano-T specimen; usually that's more of an Albertosaurinae feature.
But then Daspletosaurus and Teratophoneus came to my mind, so maybe you're right
Or maybe we're both wrong, who knows? ;D
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Post by dinoguy2 on May 12, 2011 20:00:33 GMT
The more i read about it, the more i'm persuaded "Raptorex" is just another baby Tarbo, and Peter Larson is right. Oh, and if, as the study says, young Tarbos had the same number of teeth of the adults, and considering tarbo is VERY close to T.rex, this could mean that Nano-T is really a valid genus... Or maybe Jane and the other supposed Nano-T specimen are juveniles of a still unidentified Albertosaurinae living alongside Rexy. On the other hand, we know that the number of teeth in Gorgosaurus libratus became reduced as it grew. Tarbo is closer to Tyranno than Gorgo is, but there's no evidence to suggest keeping the same number of teeth is or isn't a unique feature that evolved in Tarbo, and Tyranno still shared the primitive albertosaurine condition. Also consider the fact that in tyrannosaurus, the skull underwent heavier modification as it aged, the most out of any tyrannosaur. The snout became very broad, while Tarbo retained a fairly narrow snout as seen from above. So we shouldn't assume the same ontogenetic changes apply. This is the same conclusion the new paper comes to, btw. Need more info to tell how this might apply to T. rex. An actual study and description of Jane would be nice... That said, the juvenile Tarb also shows a very different braincase anatomy from adults, which was another line of evidence used to distinguish Nanotyrannus as a unique species. Maybe Bakker will decide this baby Tarb is a new genus, Nanotarbos or something?  |
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Post by zopteryx on May 13, 2011 0:09:48 GMT
I wonder what small prey the baby Tarbo (assuming that's what it is) was hunting? Ornithimimids maybe, but he'd need to be fast. Was any more of the skeleton recovered, legs perhaps?
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Post by Horridus on May 13, 2011 15:22:46 GMT
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Post by Griffin on May 13, 2011 21:50:24 GMT
I think juvy tyrannosaurids were supposedly very fast. Wouldn't surprise me if they were going after ornithomimids. They very easily could have been snatching even smaller game too. I think of crocodillians and the different types of prey they eat as they grow.
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Post by arioch on May 15, 2011 21:27:24 GMT
Very interesting find!
And yes basically juvenile tyrannosaurids seem to had typical coelurosaurian traits. Long legs with ankles longer than carnosaurs of the same age, built to run. I suspect one of the reasons why dromaeosaurs were so puny in the tyrannosaurid habitats (compared to the early crecaeous ones) is because young tyrannos filled all their niches and were even better suited than them to take down small-medium prey, hence they dwarfed.
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