Did X animal hunted Y animal?

[Megalosaurus]

Hi.

1) Can you please tell me if there was a possibility that Postosuchus and Plateosaurus meet each other? Did Postosuchus preyed on Plateosaurus?

2) Did T. Rex preyed on Styracosaurus?

3) Did T. Rex preyed on Edmontosaurus?

4) What were the prey of Carnotaurus?

Don't get me wrong. I'm new to paleontology, and most of the information in internet is inconclusive and confuse.

Thank you.

[Pachyrhinosaurus]

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1) Can you please tell me if there was a possibility that Postosuchus and Plateosaurus meet each other? Did Postosuchus preyed on Plateosaurus?

AFAIK, both lived at the same time but were found on different continents (although most were together at the time).

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2) Did T. Rex preyed on Styracosaurus?

No. Styracosaurus lived in the Campanian, Tyrannosaurus lived later in the Maastrichtian

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3) Did T. Rex preyed on Edmontosaurus?

Yes

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4) What were the prey of Carnotaurus?

I think Uberatitan may have been a prey source.

[tyrantqueen]

Does anyone know if Dimetrodon preyed upon Edaphosaurus? Thanks

[Zelan]

2) Did T. Rex preyed on Styracosaurus?

Gorgosaurus or Daspletosaurus would have preyed on styracosaurus i think.

Does anyone know if Dimetrodon preyed upon Edaphosaurus? Thanks

Probably, they were contemporaries. They showed dimetrodon hunting edaphosaurus in walking with monsters.

[Dinoguy2]

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4) What were the prey of Carnotaurus?

I think Uberatitan may have been a prey source.

Uberabatitan is from the upper portions of the Marília Formation, so it would be Late Maastrichtian in age (around 68-65.5 million years ago, same time frame as T. rex). Carnotaurus is from the early Maastrichtian, so the two probably did not meet.

No other dinosaurs are known from the same formation (~habitat) as Carnotaurus, though some sauropods like Baurutitan lived at the same time, they were in different regions.

Of course there's no law of nature saying theropods only ate other dinosaurs. Carnotaurus could have preyed on turtles and various stem-crocs. Juveniles could have subsisted on lizards, snakes and mammals.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Colonia_Formation

[Megalosaurus]

Thanks to all of YOU for your answers.

1) Can you please tell me if there was a possibility that Postosuchus and Plateosaurus meet each other? Did Postosuchus preyed on Plateosaurus?

AFAIK, both lived at the same time but were found on different continents (although most were together at the time).

So, am i wrong to think that migration of plateosaurus herds make posible both species meet each other?
I believe that the first chapter of WWD show plateosaurus invading the (dead)postosuchus environment at the last minute.

Of course there's no law of nature saying theropods only ate other dinosaurs. Carnotaurus could have preyed on turtles and various stem-crocs. Juveniles could have subsisted on lizards, snakes and mammals.

This is a very good point.

[wings]

No other dinosaurs are known from the same formation (~habitat) as Carnotaurus, though some sauropods like Baurutitan lived at the same time, they were in different regions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Colonia_Formation

That I'm not so sure since if you look at the original paper (http://www.nhm.org/site/sites/default/files/pdf/contrib_science/CS416.pdf); Carnotaurus was found near the top of the Cerro Barcino Formation (also known as the Gorro Frigio Formation) which sits underneath the La Colonia Formation. And this Formation (Cerro Barcino) does contain some titansaurid remains.

[Turret]

If I may hijack this thread for a moment. What dinosaurs (or other prehistoric life) lived alongside Europasaurus?

[Dinoguy2]

No other dinosaurs are known from the same formation (~habitat) as Carnotaurus, though some sauropods like Baurutitan lived at the same time, they were in different regions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Colonia_Formation

That I'm not so sure since if you look at the original paper (http://www.nhm.org/site/sites/default/files/pdf/contrib_science/CS416.pdf); Carnotaurus was found near the top of the Cerro Barcino Formation (also known as the Gorro Frigio Formation) which sits underneath the La Colonia Formation. And this Formation (Cerro Barcino) does contain some titansaurid remains.

I'm not sure of the details, but I do remember there being confusion initially over which formation Carnotaurus was found in. Back when it was first found I remember it being thought of as Albian in age! So the original description might be in error there.

If I may hijack this thread for a moment. What dinosaurs (or other prehistoric life) lived alongside Europasaurus?

I don't think the age is well understood, there seems to be a ~5 million year margin of error in the estimated date. But it comes from *around* the same time and place as Archaeopteryx, Compsognathus, Pterodactylus, and Rhamphorhycnhus etc., so I'd expect those or similar animals to be around.

EDIT: Just checked the supplementary info to the original paper, and it looks like the age is better understood than I thought- about 154 million years old. So it's a couple million years earlier than the Solnhofen formation.

[wings]

If I may hijack this thread for a moment. What dinosaurs (or other prehistoric life) lived alongside Europasaurus?

In Sander et al. (2006) paper; they mentioned there are remains of theropods, pterosaurs, atoposaurid crocodiles, turtles, and fishes; invertebrates include bivalves, gastropods, foraminifera and ostracods are most common from the site. Nothing specific so most likely these are quite scrappy materials.

I'm not sure of the details, but I do remember there being confusion initially over which formation Carnotaurus was found in. Back when it was first found I remember it being thought of as Albian in age! So the original description might be in error there.

Just have a quick look at Rauhut et al. (2003) and it does mention the reasoning is based on palynological study by Archangelsky(?) (it was listed as personal communication from the paper so I'm not sure whether the actual data was published...). In that case we are probably still going to have titanosauriform sauropods at this age such as Chubutisaurus ( Rauhut et al. 2003).

[Dinoguy2]

If I may hijack this thread for a moment. What dinosaurs (or other prehistoric life) lived alongside Europasaurus?

In Sander et al. (2006) paper; they mentioned there are remains of theropods, pterosaurs, atoposaurid crocodiles, turtles, and fishes; invertebrates include bivalves, gastropods, foraminifera and ostracods are most common from the site. Nothing specific so most likely these are quite scrappy materials.

I'm not sure of the details, but I do remember there being confusion initially over which formation Carnotaurus was found in. Back when it was first found I remember it being thought of as Albian in age! So the original description might be in error there.

Just have a quick look at Rauhut et al. (2003) and it does mention the reasoning is based on palynological study by Archangelsky(?) (it was listed as personal communication from the paper so I'm not sure whether the actual data was published...). In that case we are probably still going to have titanosauriform sauropods at this age such as Chubutisaurus ( Rauhut et al. 2003).

Yeah, it would be odd for titanosaurs not to be around, and they are known from other formations of equivalent age. I just think it's not necessarily safe to assume that because one dinosaur is present in a specific environment, others must have as well. Especially in LK south America where there appear to be some environments dominated by stem-crocs.

[wings]

Yeah, it would be odd for titanosaurs not to be around, and they are known from other formations of equivalent age. I just think it's not necessarily safe to assume that because one dinosaur is present in a specific environment, others must have as well. Especially in LK south America where there appear to be some environments dominated by stem-crocs.

Is it such a far-fetched assumption?

"...Chubutisaurus is thus most probably of Late Cretaceous age. Likewise, the abelisaurid Carnotaurus,... is now known to have come from the La Colonia Formation, which, according to new palynological evidence, is Maastrichtian in age..." (Rauhut et al. 2003)

So age wise they are quite similar, they are both found in the Chubut group (see below). So I don't think the assumption is really that "out there"...



Cretaceous fossil localities (theropods), "Ch" = Chubut group



Cretaceous fossil localities (sauropods), "Ch" = Chubut group

Even if some areas are dominated with stem-crocs; is it safe to assume that animals can't or won't move around and confined to one area due to this reason?

I don't think the age is well understood, there seems to be a ~5 million year margin of error in the estimated date. But it comes from *around* the same time and place as Archaeopteryx, Compsognathus, Pterodactylus, and Rhamphorhycnhus etc., so I'd expect those or similar animals to be around.

Isn't your assumption on Europasaurus even more dubious?

[Dinoguy2]

Isn't your assumption on Europasaurus even more dubious?

Yup, which is why I corrected myself. And that assumption was even worse since it was dealing with island species, which tend to be highly endemic.

I'm not saying it's a bad assumption, just pointing out that it is an assumption. It seems likely to me that Carnotaurus lived alongside some titanosaur. As far as I know, though, there's no positive evidence for this yet. Based on North American dino ecology (another assumption), species turned over every 500,000 years or so and were highly provincial. Utahceratops never met Vagaceratops because one lived a few hunderd miles further north and a few hundred thousand years later.

Is it such a far-fetched assumption?

I never said it was.

is it safe to assume that animals can't or won't move around and confined to one area due to this reason?

It's not safe to assume anything. It's a fair assumption, but one with no evidence to back it up either way. And actually, based on the extreme provincialism seen in North America during the same time, it may or may not be fair to think these things moved around very much. There doesn't seem to have been any physical barrier keeping, say the Kirtland formation fauna separate from the Two Medicine formation fauna. Scott Sampson has suggested it may simply have been a matter of different plant species separated by latitude. Without some high-resolution biostratigraphy of the formations in question, we know nothing about what is likely to have lived with what, except for which bones are preserved in the same local strata. We can make guesses, like there might be an unknown titanosaur contemporary with Carnotaurus, but we need to keep in mind they're just guesses, and that alternatives, like Carnotaurus was the only dino in its ecosystem, are equally plausible right now.

[wings]

Isn't your assumption on Europasaurus even more dubious?

Yup, which is why I corrected myself. And that assumption was even worse since it was dealing with island species, which tend to be highly endemic.

I'm not saying it's a bad assumption, just pointing out that it is an assumption. It seems likely to me that Carnotaurus lived alongside some titanosaur. As far as I know, though, there's no positive evidence for this yet. Based on North American dino ecology (another assumption), species turned over every 500,000 years or so and were highly provincial. Utahceratops never met Vagaceratops because one lived a few hunderd miles further north and a few hundred thousand years later.

Yeah and some of them are from south side of the country while others are from the North...

I never have stated this as fact and this would be an assumption made on *Rauhut's paper since they did the work and published a paper about the site. I'm merely referencing their findings. It wasn't my own suggestion. I took the age from *Rauhut's and the locations from Novas (2009). It is just an assumption based on published papers.

I probably don't have to reply to the rest of the paragraph since it was based on another assumption.

*Rauhut, O.W.M., Cladera, G., Vickers-Rich, P. and Rich, T.H. 2003. Dinosaur remains from the Lower Cretaceous of the Chubut Group, Argentina. Cretaceous Research 24 (5): 487-497.

Is it such a far-fetched assumption?

I never said it was.

Yeah, and all you said was "...I just think it's not necessarily safe to assume..." which I would have interpreted as the possibility is extremely slim to none.

is it safe to assume that animals can't or won't move around and confined to one area due to this reason?

It's not safe to assume anything. It's a fair assumption, but one with no evidence to back it up either way. And actually, based on the extreme provincialism seen in North America during the same time, it may or may not be fair to think these things moved around very much. There doesn't seem to have been any physical barrier keeping, say the Kirtland formation fauna separate from the Two Medicine formation fauna. Scott Sampson has suggested it may simply have been a matter of different plant species separated by latitude. Without some high-resolution biostratigraphy of the formations in question, we know nothing about what is likely to have lived with what, except for which bones are preserved in the same local strata. We can make guesses, like there might be an unknown titanosaur contemporary with Carnotaurus, but we need to keep in mind they're just guesses, and that alternatives, like Carnotaurus was the only dino in its ecosystem, are equally plausible right now.

I've never stated that they are contemporaries as fact. Of course these are all possibilities but I just find some are more favorable than the others (based on published work and certainly not based on "nothing" as you are implying here). I suppose you don't have to agree with *Rauhut's paper (though that was probably one of the earliest papers correcting Carnotaurus' age). If you've read the same paper then it is rather unusual that you would cherry pick the age for Carnotaurus from it (Rauhut et al. 2003) while you would dismiss other findings (such as the comment on Chubutisaurus) from the same paper. In giving the example of the Kirtland formation fauna and the Two Medicine formation fauna, I'm not sure why you would bring this up since this is kind of similar to the reasoning you gave about the animals before ("...not necessarily safe to assume that because one dinosaur is present in a specific environment, others must have as well...") so if I'm using the same logic then how could one formation compare to another (as in we can't tell whether they are under the similar constraint as the formation we are discussing right now)? The example would be kind of nullified. I can only see this as "equally" plausible if I deny Rauhut's comments and Nova's location diagrams. My point was always about titanosauriform sauropods and "Chubutisaurus" was just a possible example (All I said was... "In that case we are probably still going to have titanosauriform sauropods at this age such as Chubutisaurus...").

[amargasaurus cazaui]

Could it be possible they all preyed on little things called Nit-picks? lol

[wings]

Could it be possible they all preyed on little things called Nit-picks? lol

Probably if you could make a discovery of this new creature in their diet and name it "Nit-picks", I suppose...