Paleo Profile: Southern Titan, Giganotosaurus · 7:23am Apr 29th, 2018
Foreword
You guys don't understand. How much of a clusterf#$@. This subject is. Good dear God, EVERYONE in the paleontology circles was collectively running about like rats in a ship over this for over a decade and it still hasn't cooled. If you so much as bring up some names in a group, you just lit off the kindle box. Storytime now for context.
From the first material uncovered in 1874 up until 1905 when the first skeletons were officially described and documented by John Osborne and Barnum Brown, Tyrannosaurus Rex was the undisputed uncontested king of the dinosaurs. The largest predatory beast to ever walk the land by a wide margin. With several more skeletons found in the following decades, it was possible to put together a fairly complete picture of a total creature. The size, completeness, and countries of origin (Canada and USA) made it a sure win as a star creature across pop culture.
For 100 years, Tyrannosaurus Rex was completely unchallenged for its throne; a claim bolstered by the discovery of its equally huge twin from Mongolia, Tyrannosaurus bataar (sometimes labeled Tarbosaurus bataar). There were several carnivores of great size that came as potential rivals for the top spot as they were discovered up until the turn of the century. Genuine Jurassic titans like Torvosaurus showed themselves to be of admirable scale approaching Tyrannosaurus’, but fell short.
Kin to the now dethroned Allosaurus later dubbed Saurophaganax and Epanterias grew even bigger, equaling Tyrannosaurus rex and Tyrannosaurus bataar in length and height, but were found to be significantly lighter due to a leaner build like how a leopard is lighter to a much heavier and more muscular jaguar. A close call came in the 1940s-1950s when a descendent of Allosaurus and its relation was discovered in Oklahoma and Texas, USA. Bearing a raised ridge across its spine, Acrocanthosaurus came within spitting distance of Tyrannosaurus’ scale; but just barely got edged out at a slightly shorter height and length and up to 15% less mass.
There were however almost mythic finds from northern Africa of two predators of enormous scale found by Ernest Stromer, Carcharodontosaurus and Spinosaurus. These two potentially rivaled or even exceeded Tyrannosaurus in bulk or scale, but before the finds could be well studied they were destroyed in WW2. And thus outside of rumors, Tyrannosaurus reigned as king and khan with T.rex and T.bataar.
But into the early 1990s, things began to change. It started with a perilous expedition by Paul Sereno and his team into the Sahara, retracing Stromer’s steps in hopes of discovery or rediscovering his lost creatures. This toil through desert, sharp mountains, and fossil poachers bore fruit when they came back with a remarkably complete Carcharodontosaurus. It proved to be huge, as shown by the lifesize head model Sereno had made. This was a creature to rival Tyrannosaurus for sure, at up to 42 feet long and of comparable mass. But just as the debate of if the “Shark Toothed Reptile” could topple the “Tyrant Reptile” was getting rolling, another creature was discovered.
In 1988, a lower jaw was unearthed but the odd shape and lack of context made it hard to determine what kind of dinosaur it was, other than it clearly was a carnivore. Context was given years later when Rubén D. Carolini was out riding his dune buggy in the badlands of Patagonia in 1993 when he found a massive tibia. A dig was conducted and a nearly 70% complete skeleton was unearthed and was a huge 40-44 ft long specimen. But when the 1988 find was brought up for comparison, it was discovered to be the same species, only this individual was even larger. Jorge Calvo and his colleague estimated it to belong to a creature at least 8% larger than the 1993 creature, resulting in a whopping 46 feet long from nose to tail with a near 6 foot long skull. Measurements of bone thickness of the 1993 specimen found to it be even larger than Carcharodontosaurus and of comparable size to the then largest Tyrannosaurus, “Sue”. This implied the 1988 specimen, while lacking skeletal traits, belonged to an even larger animal. Potentially, the largest terrestrial predator ever known.
The new creature was christened a name befitting its behemoth scale and to honor to its discoverer, Giganotosaurus carolinii; Carolini’s Giant (Giga) Southern (Notos) Reptile (Saurus).
Profile
Species: Giganotosaurus (Gig-ga-NO-toe-Saur-us or Jig-ga-NO-toe-saur-us)* carolinii
Family: Carnosaurs, Carcharodontosauridae
Location: South America, Patagonia
Time: Cenomanian age, Mid-Late Cretaceous period 98-97 MYA
Height: 13 feet at the hips, 20 feet reared up
Length: 40-46 feet
Weight: 7.5-10 tons
Habitat: Swamps, floodplains, semi-open forests
Armament: Massive jaws, heavily serrated teeth, three recurved talons on arms, extremely powerful legs
*No it is not “Gigantosaurus” (Gi-gant-toe-saurus), that is something completely different. There’s two “o”s and “Notos” means ‘southern’ to reflect its continent of origin.
Giganotosaurus seemed to be like Carcharodontosaurus +1, extremely similar in build akin to how a tiger is to a lion; just in different locales and one being slightly larger than the other. They were both Carnosaurs, descendents of Jurassic super predators like Allosaurus and Saurophaganax that roamed the southern supercontinent of Gondwana (Africa, South America, Australia, Antarctica, and India). And if Carcharodontosaurus seemed big enough to rival Tyrannosaurus, Giga seemed poised to finally surpass it.
Needless to say, it was a media frenzy. A meat-eater that seemed larger than the world famous king of the dinosaurs. It only got more berserk when new finds of Spinosaurus had it join the fray as another potential suitor for the title of “Largest Predator to Walk the Earth”. And the fanboys came out of the woodwork. I swear one couldn’t see a single program featuring Giganotosaurus or Spinosaurus without having them fight a Tyrannosaurus or be pitted against them in a competition. No peace to be found.
You either got exaggerated monsters in the installments the newcomers toppled the Tyrannosaurus like Dino Crisis 2’s kaiju sized Giganotosaurus (the f***er was 20+ meters TALL) or Jurassic Park 3’s roided up Spinosaurus who behaved more like a ticked off stalker than a dinosaur; or you had a Tyrannosaurus charging in and curb-stomping the competition like in Primal Carnage. This carried up viciously in the 2000s and I even see a lot of it today. You virtually can’t say anything about Giganotosaurus, Carcharodontosaurus, or Spinosaurus without someone bringing up them vs. ol’ Rexy. New finds of Tyrannosaurus bigger than “Sue” were trumpeted as Rexy “reclaiming” its throne while other finds of the other super heavyweight theropods kept juggling their masses around every other year.
So I’m not even going to bother fighting it. But rather than have ‘em fight in some drawn out brawl, I’m just going to tell it to you straight. If, by temporal and spacial warping, a Giganotosaurus and Tyrannosaurus met they would… probably just look at each other for a bit, growl or bark a bit, and then walk off on their merry way because they’re smart enough to know even if they won a fight, any injuries could get infected or cripple their ability to hunt. And if they did have a knock down, no-holds barred brawl; either one of them might kill the other regardless of who had the slight size advantage.
As it stands right now, it remains to be seen exactly how the genera stack up in terms of size. Giga seems to be a bit longer and potentially taller than Tyranno, but it’s debatable due to limited finds and some seemingly outlier Tyrannosaurus specimens as to which one was heavier given the giant Ceolurosaurian has a wider torso and bulkier head than the Carnosaur; but the Carnosaur had a longer head, tail, and larger arms.
Currently most reliable data seems to show the two at least did have a significant overlap in terms of size, however the number of Tyrannosaurus smaller than Sue and the 1993 Giga outnumber the ones larger than either. This seems to suggest that on average, Tyrannosaurus rex was indeed a bit smaller than Giganotosaurus with Spinosaurus being a wildcard in terms of mass when it comes to large theropods because it’s build is so unique it’s very hard to judge its shape. However, much like a comparison between lions and tigers, even if one might have been marginally larger than the other; it is extremely possible to find a Tyrannosaurus bigger than your average Giganotosaurus.
So tentatively, and keep in mind this is subject to constant change according to new finds or revisions of mass estimates, the largest theropods according to mass seem to be-
1. Spinosaurus aegyptiacus
2. Giganotosaurus carolini
3. Tyrannosaurus rex
4. Carcharodontosaurus saharicus
Pictured left to right, Spinosaurus, Giganotosaurus, Carcharodontosaurus, and Tyrannosaurus
Past these you get into a massive number of variation, genera, and species that have such large ranges in body mass estimates it gets extremely difficult to tell who was bigger or bulkier than who. And different studies might reshuffle members of this list.
Bearing in mind Spinosaurus appears to be amphibious and has a huge range of mass estimations (some as low as 5 tons, some as high as 16 tons), this means Giganotosaurus has a good chance at being the largest terrestrial carnivore ever known alongside the other close contenders like Tyrannosaurus and Carcharodontosaurus. These four have been and will continued to be shuffled over, and over, and over again. Basically the four have been in a big cartoon dust cloud fight. Thusly, I ask people keep in mind many on this list have a limited number of specimens and thus our idea of what is the average for the species might be skewed.
Similarly the means and methods of estimating mass for animals that are long since extinct without many close modern comparisons can lead to drastically different results. Scott Hartman for instance is of the opinion the Sue specimen is much heavier than the 1993 holotype Giga, and feels the size estimation of the 1988 find is debatable on what percentage larger it truly was. It might be smaller, of similar size, or larger than Sue. However others like Gerardo Mazzetta cite the opposite. The only thing that seems certain is the first four or so on my list are so extremely close in size that the average of each species probably were within a ton of each other and very close to the same height or length. We’re dealing with animals whose specimens are within 5-9% of the size range of each other.
So in the end who’d win in what fight or who was biggest is pretty redundant. Not every Tyrannosaurus rex is going to be a 40+ foot Sue scaled behemoth, in fact most are a good deal smaller, nor is every Giganotosaurus carolini going to be to the scale of the 1988 individual, like the 1993 specimen.
Just as much, even if you somehow got them to fight to the death, size doesn’t guarantee a win. Tigers on average outsize lions but there are almost as many accounts of lions killing tigers as the other way around. Even if one of them killed the other outright, it might die of its wounds after, Giga from crushed bones and Tyranno from blood loss, or both from infection.
But, if there was ever a creature who preyed upon the beasts of the land that could topple Brown and Osborn’s Tyrant King for size that I could guess with good confidence; Carolini’s Southern Giant has my bet.
So how do the two differ?
Well the first and most obvious be body shape and skin covering. Tyrannosaurids and all other Ceolurosaurians likely had some degree of protofeathers, quills, or feathers. How much exactly is still hotly debated, as is if the feathers persisted in all life stages or all times of year (some suggest they might be seasonal); but the chance is there alongside an amount of thick scales we know it had on its feet and face. As a Carnosaur however, Giga was definitely covered by non-overlapping scales, much like those found on the bellies and flanks of crocodilians (but probably not bony scutes found on such animals’ backs).
The overall body proportions also differed. Tyrannosaurus is overall slightly shorter and wider, whereas Giganotosaurus is taller and leaner proportionally. The Tyrannosaurus’ wider build and more barrel shaped chest would assist in fueling prolonged movement through an open area, giving space for large lungs and a strong neck. Giganotosaurus by comparison had a leaner build which might be an adaptation for a habitat with less dense foliage as it could assist in faster acceleration and overall top speed in a burst. Estimates for Tyrannosaurus put its top speed at anywhere between 15-20 mph, whereas Giganotosaurus go as high as 31 mph.
Another pretty obvious difference was in the size of the arms. While both Tyrannosaurus and Giganotosaurus bore shortened forelimbs is probably an adaptation to reduce top-heavyness (as any enlargement of the arms would need to be matched with increased weight in the tail to balance it and keep the center of gravity at its hips, weighing the animal down), Giganotosaurus bears much larger claws and proportionally larger arms with three claws to Tyrannosaurus’ two. Muscle attachment for both suggests they’d be quite powerful, but the southern Carnosaur seems more so and definitely appears to have used them more often. One possibility was that the Giganotosaurus would seize its prey with its claws and then repeatedly bite into it while holding it down.
The bite of the creatures themselves also differed. Tyrannosaurus is near legendary for its crushing bite force, which has been estimated as potentially exceeding 60,000-80,000 newtons. This is achieved through robust teeth, wide jaws, and a very wide skull filled with anchor points for the muscles. It’s been suggested Tyrannosaurus adapted this bite to counter the more robust and armored herbivores common to late Cretaceous North America. The target would likely be the head or neck and be compressed, either crushing the bones outright or suffocating it.
Pictured left to right, Giganotosaurus, Tyrannosaurus, Carcharodontosaurus
Giganotosaurus by comparison had a thinner, longer skull and a bite with an overall force that was several times weaker in terms of pressure. However despite what some T.rex fanboys will state, this didn’t make it less dangerous. Studies indicate Carnosaurs were capable of opening their mouths extremely wide and could snap them down at very high speed. The ‘chin’ Giganotosaurus sports would have additionally aided in resisting torsion forces associated with biting muscular areas and the target thrashing back. Thus once it locked down, it wasn't coming off without taking flesh out with it.
This along with a distinct tooth shape indicates Giganotosaurus would target the more soft tissue and muscle heavy regions of prey like the flanks, limbs, and throat extremely well. Carnosaur teeth are almost ridiculously heavily serrated, having large serrations on both sides instead of only on the backs like in Tyrannosaurus (which are more lightly serrated on the front). Stromer named Carcharodontosaurus “Great White Shark Tooth Reptile” for a reason!
These teeth were also more pointed and thinner than the Tyrannosaurus’, meaning while they didn’t crush bone they excelled at leaving horrific shredding injuries that would heavily bleed. Thus it seems Giganotosaurus’ strategy was to land multiple quick bites, possibly while holding onto the prey with its claws, and cause them to go into shock and bleed to death. This was likely an adaptation to hunting large hadrosaurids and younger sauropods, who have so much body mass it would be near impossible to kill them in one blow. This makes up for the relative lack of jaw strength compared to the likes of Tyrannosaurus, as Carcharodontosaurids like the group's namesake and its South American twin could land multiple bites very rapidly that cause absolutely horrific shredding injuries. To make a comparison to fire arms, if Tyrannosaurus' wide, robust, but smoother teeth acted like armor piercing, full metal jacket bullets; Giganotosaurus' and its relation like Carcharodontosaurus' teeth were equivilent to hollow point or claw bullets in a trade of penetration for raw flesh damage.
One thing of note is both probably were capable of hunting in loose groups or solo, however given the higher number of large Sauropods in its range, Giganotosaurus was likely more prone to it.
Or to illustrate, getting bitten across your middle by a Tyrannosaurus would mean you’d pop like a grape. Getting bitten across your middle by a Giganotosaurus or Carcharodontosaurus would slice you in two like a guillotine. Mouth full of armor piercing bullets and a mouth full of butcher knives, equally deadly for two different reasons. Again, there is no such thing as an ultimate predator; just different ones adapted to different environments. A Giganotosaurus in Late Cretaceous North America would be just as unsuccessful as a Tyrannosaurus in Middle Cretaceous South America.
Now for Trivia
1. Sir Not-Appearing in This Game
Giganoto almost made its debut in the Jurassic Park series as a boss fight for the Buck T.rex levels of "The Lost World: Jurassic Park" for consoles like the PS1. It was cut late into the game and replaced with Allosaurus, but concept art survives.
The design for the JP incarnation would survive into the next game, "Warpath: Jurassic Park", a fighting game also for PS1 among others; alongside close relation Carcharodontosaurus. In it, the Giganoto functions as a slow, but very powerful fighter.
2. Hard to Get, Not Playing
Giganoto fossils are considered a national treasure in Argentina and very rarely, if ever, leave the country.This means a vast majority of skeletons in Museums are replica, however even these are very hard to get. While the exact number is unknown, only a few cast skeletons were created and are on permanent display outside of Argentina.
Pictured, cast Giganotosaurus skeleton in Cocoa Beach Museum of Dinosaur and Ancient Cultures, Florida, USA
3. Indominus Giga
The Giganotosaurus was listed as one of the genetic templates for the hybrid Indominus Rex monster from Jurassic World. This actually makes a lot of sense given the Indominus shares far more Carcharodontosaurid traits than it does Tyrannosaurid ones given skull shape, eye crests, and stature. In earlier scripts, the Indominus was supposed to be a Chinese Carcharodontosaurid called a "Malasaurus/Malusaurus" and earlier concept art even shows it with a much more typical Carcharodontosaurid body type.
So why in the blue-blazes its listed as a "T.rex-Raptor" hybrid in the games is beyond me, likely play on the two types popularity in the public eye. I agree with RickRaptor more, hehehehehe.
4. Fitting Location
It's almost hilariously fitting that the name of the area Giga fossils have been found, Patagonia, coincidentally means "Land of Giant Feet". While originally used to describe the natives and possibly fossils tracks of giant ground sloths, its a deserving name given Giganotosaurus had feet over a meter wide and even more so lengthwise.
5. Crocodile on the mind
Endocasts of Giganotosaurus' ancestors and cousins indicate a brain shaped very similar to a modern crocodile. Crocodilians are exceptional hunters due to both intelligence and sensory abilities. They could smell better than most mammalian carnivores, extremely sharp hearing, and potentially could see into the UV spectrum as well as have excellent night-vision and decent color vision.
One oddity however is because of its very long, relatively narrow head, Giganotosaurus didn't have the best binocular vision and even had a small blind spot a few feet in front of its nose. The trade off to this is extremely wide fields of view to the point it could practically see behind it and cover its flanks. Besides, sharp senses of smell and hearing would tip it off if someone was trying to hide literally under its nose.
Intelligence would actually be surprisingly high and thus it was likely very capable of some problem-solving abilities, coordination, complex communication, and strategy. Crocodilians are capable of both setting traps, long distance communication, monogamy, as well as caring for their offspring. It is very likely Giganotosaurus was capable of these as well.
PS: If you guys really demand it, I WILL do a Giga vs. _____ brawl. Yes, even after my tirade against ____ vs. T.rex, Giga vs. T.rex is a possibility
I think this Paleo Profile is quite a pretty piece of useful information.
Very well done and informative.
And now I know more about the Giganotosaurus.
Thanks :D
Am I the only one who always found the whole size thing to be a bit silly? Of course the size of a species is going to vary so the size comparison if the two ever met is a toss up.
For me personally, the first time is heard of Giganotosaurus was in BBC’s Chased by Dinisaurs, and i remember thinking “this guys a giant Allosaures, cool, T-Rex’s skull is still cooler” and left it at that.
Anyways, great profile on a Dino who sparks debates that make Goku vs Superman look tame in comparison.
I've always been a fan of the giga. I still remember when I learned about it in the 1st grade, of course at that time all I new was that it was a carnivorous dino that was bigger than the T-rex, but still.
So Tarb, given Giga's differing hunting adaptions, would that make him more likely to succeed where T-rex failed in the Rex vs Brontosaurus match up? I mean, Giga was built to hunt sauropods right? Surely he'd do a better job in that fight.
As for an actual versus, how about we flip that script a little bit. Just as T-rex was sent up against the seminal sauropod and wasn't ready for what the entailed, how about giving Giga a go at T-rex's iconic enemy? The Triceratops! Now there's gonna be an interesting battle to think about eh?
I was wondering when this was gonna pop up. And I liked what I saw, except the fact that Carcharo is lighter than Rex(
), but concurring with what the others are saying, this is indeed educational(you ever thought of becoming a teacher?), and a lot of what I suspected about Giga parallels this blog like the trivia subject of I-Rex resembling a Carnosaur, and that Carnosaurs having similar brains to crocodilians could reflect the high intelligence you've mentioned. That said, Carcharo is still my personal favorite dino, and I would like to see a brawl involving Giga.
4849819
To be honest, V. I was expecting to fight the Kaiju-sized Giga in the final chapter of that RPG we played, and I was a little disappointed to find out that wasn't the case, but it was still an epic and tense boss fight we had. Anyway, how are you?
4849986
Yeah sorry about that, it's just most estimates I found as of late tend to put the T.rex as just barely edging out Carcharo in total mass. However ol'Stromer's shark tooth giant is just about as tall and long. Heck, given Giga was likely faster than Tyranno while still being potentially heavier just means a slightly lighter Carcharo be even quicker on its feet. I wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if Carcharo was actually very fast and agile for it's size, up to 32+mph.
4850023
Honestly, I'm not bothered in the slightest about the difference in mass. But I still would like to see a Giga brawl, or possibly a Carcharo vs. Ceratopsid match...
4849986
https://youtu.be/LfRqiAQknwA?t=68
Nicely researched and very informative.
Very well researched and presented. I enjoyed reading this.
Since you asked, perhaps we can have a Giganotosaurus vs Shantungosaurus match-up someday.
After all, Hadrosaurs are usually associated with Tyrannosaurs as preditors, so this would likely not be a typical encounter, but should be reasonably close in terms of the size of prey for this animal, and not requiring as much specialized adaption to deal with as a Ceratopsian. Then again, I could be wrong; just because most of the Hadrosaur finds I've heard of were from the northern landmasses doesn't mean they were absent from the southern ones. What was the distribution of Hadrosaurs, anyway?
Damn Tarb, considering the scale (pun intended) of these behemoths, I'm starting to think that my reluctance to have my Godzillasaurus be 20' ft tall was misguided. If real-actual dinosaurs were packing this level of might, then I can certainly let a fictional proto-kaiju swing those numbers.
Fantastic article by the way Tarb. sometimes you lose me with all the technical terminology, but I was really interested in the little narrative you laid out.
I would though comment on your frustration on fanboys having flamewars over who the top-dino was. Technical aspects is fine for academics and scholars, but for the every-day Joe and Jane smith, we like to understand our historical characters in terms of narratives. When people put the T-Rex as the King of the Dinosaurs, then argue about any new contenders, I think they're arguing mostly about his place in the narrative of history.
Considering humans are a creature that likes to imbue meaning into things, it's no surprise that some might look to the T-Rex as having a unique place in the history of the world, and perceived attempts to displace him might rub them the wrong way. It'd be like if a flamewar broke out over George Washington being the "Father of America", or some such other sentimental position we give historical characters.
The T-Rex being known as the "King of the Dinosaurs" is a moniker that obviously has no real objective standard, it's more that the 'legend' of these creatures has meaning to us. The "Legend of the Tyrannosaurus Rex" is what makes him memorable to Humanity's story of the world, not that he could run so fast, or had a bite force of so-many pounds per square inch.
4850276
Anything I might be able to clear up?
A good point to make for sure. After all dinosaurs have effectively replaced mythical creatures in many aspects of story telling a pop culture. Most kids don't know what a centaur or manticore is, but they do know what a T.rex or Triceratops is.
However to clarify a point, my tirade was more about how relatively redundant the pop-culture uses of "T.rex vs. ___" are because most of them boil down to exaggerating one of the parties involved so they win the fight decisively. We don't get knock-down, drag out brawls between two relative equals like any IRL clash would be. Rather one side gets ubercharged and curb-stomps the competition. The Spinosaurus in JP3 got one, the Tyrannosaurus in Primal Carnage and various anime got one, the Giganotosaurus in Dino Crisis and (by proxy) Jurassic World as the Indominus got one.
Though the main target in my crosshairs was the futile 'fanboy flamewars'. People who post on youtube videos, online forums, or even IRL places who's writing chiefly composes of absolutely bashing the other super-theropods to prop up their chosen one. And they do this by looking up facts but completely misusing them.
Here, lemme give you an example. My article mentions how, while its jaws were strong, Giganotosaurus didn't have a crushing bite force like Tyrannosaurus rex. If you were a normal person interested in dinosaurs, you might read on and find this was because it attacked differently and prioritized slicing power, shredding wounds, and rapid-fire bites to inflict damage. Ergo, it's just as effective a killing tool as Tyrannosaurus' chomp, just used in a different way. A T.rex fanboy would read that all as, "Lawl, Giga has a whimpy ass bite T.rex would just shrug off. It was a weaker predator who couldn't fight. T.rex just run in and then crush it in one chomp, 80,0000 newton crush!"
See my point? Rather than admiring both animals from a biological standpoint or just enjoying the fact multiple titans of such power and ability ones existed for use in modern legends, fanboyism consists of tearing down one to prop up the other. And in the early 2000s especially, it was extremely annoying how you couldn't even mention Giganotosaurus without some T.rex fanboy saying something stupid, then a Giga fanboy charging in, and then the fun's ruined for everyone.
4850257
Yeah I wouldn't be against it. Now keep in mind a Giga might be 20 feet, but only when it was leaning up some. Only dinosaur that's a biped (or least part time one) that be around 20 feet tall is Shantungosaurus and a possibly one other herbivore not much info is out on. In its neutral posture, it was about 13-14ft. So having a 19 or 20 foot theropod in a neutral pose I think is still big while not being outlandishly huge. So I'd actually so go for it!
4850372
My concern was that he'd be a formidable threat already with just a conservative scaling of his size and capabilities, I didn't want to stack the odds too absurdly against Cap and Bucky. I am willing to sacrifice a bit of technical accuracy for the sake of a compelling narrative, but I did want some kind of reference for the purposes of interactions. It's fine if a bad guy gets ripped to shreds in the jaws of a huge predator, I don't necessarily need him to explode from the bite force, as interesting a visual as that might be.
Oh, but I may call upon you again to help with with some metrics of the more 'recognized' beast-gods that appear in TLP. Armadon might be an especially interesting case study.
4850353
What I meant, is that often when you name the many different prehistoric creatures, for example, I have no idea what they are or what the name is supposed to tell me about them. Even as a fan of etymology, you do have a habit of forcing me to Bing-search for a picture of the creature you're naming. It's a great relief when you do include pictures in the body of the blog. Not for lack of respect for the field, but I don't follow the latest news in paleontology and archeology as you have cause to do for your education, work, and personal passion.
4850353
I see what you mean. It's the same syndrome that affects the "Deathbattle" fanbase. They get bogged down in the specifics and number-crunching, they kinda loose sight of the bigger picture. In this case, with two large predators, you really have no good way of deciding a victor in a fight-to-the death, especially when considering X-factors like, environment, experience, and downright luck.
Two examples I'll give you from another fantasy-battle series, "Deadliest Warrior." This show did it's own amount of number-crunching and data analysis, but they worked alot on probability as well, which was a nice X-factor.
Spartan vs. Ninja- I showed this episode to some other people, and in the final simulation, the Spartan was victorious. So of course I heard all the complaints of "Oh, the ninja would just do this, the ninja would just do that.". Missing the point that this simulation was just a representation of the summery probability of outcomes, a meta conclusion, not that the Hoplite would win every time.
Joan of Arc vs. William the Conqueror- This one actually left me furious. In the battle simulation, Joan was the winner. I was not angry perse that Joan had won, but it was rather the reasons they gave for her winning. The major factor was that Joan wore plate armor, and not the heavier hauberk like William wore. And it basically made the Bastard look like he was just downright unable to cope with an opponent with such "theoretically" superior armor. William was obviously larger, stronger, and far more experienced in brutal physical combat, the idea that he could not defeat a woman in plate was to me, beyond absurd. It literally had him slashing at steel plate like an idiot!
I will proclaim Joan d'Arc as one of the patron saints of the White race, but she would not defeat The Conqueror in armed combat. So I suppose you can take that as an example of me having a 'fanboy flame' in this particular case.
4850406
Ah, I see. Well to note it in a nutshell, something that'll help is the fact there are four basic families of Theropods that are predatory (so I'm excluding omnivorous or herbivorous families or subfamilies). Each one has distinct traits that help in telling who's who and each have a few distinct members of large size or frequent in pop culture.
Megalosaurids - The 'weird' family. Usually have short in height, long in length, rectangular heads. Three fingered hands and long arms. One distinct subgroup are Spinosaurids, which have crocodile-like heads with massive thumb claws for snatching up fish they ate. Large members include Torvosaurus and Suchomimus (pictured).
Carnosaurs - Stock big theropods. Triangular shaped heads of various length from medium to long that taper to a point. Thin in width, the skull also often has a crest or ridge above the eyes. Three fingers of short to medium arm length. Large members include Allosaurus and Giganotosaurus (pictured).
Coleurosaurs (Tyrannosaurids) - In general these were not very big. In fact they used to class all big meat eaters as Carnosaurs and all small ones as Coleurosaurs. But new findings show Tyrannosaurids were Coleurosaurs that gradually grew larger from wolf size to bus size. Skulls were long and broad, with a vaguely rectangle shape but with a more uniform height and abrupt taper at the nose as well as a robust lower jaw. Later forms only had two fingers. Likely only large predatory theropods to have some degree of feathers. Members include Yutyrannus and of course, Tyrannosaurus (pictured).
Ceratosaurids - Also called Abelisaurs, they on average were the smallest 'big theropods'. Very distinguishable trait is presence of crests and horns to degree unknown outside of the group. Later forms also had very short, almost bulldog-like snouts and tiny forelimbs. Only Theropod group to keep all four fingers as well as have dermal armor in the form of scutes. Group includes Ceratosaurus and Carnotaurus (pictured).
4850454
That torvosaurus... interesting...
Very well researched. That last bit concerning the brain case of Giga and it's cousins was of particular interest.
4850425
Ah Deadliest Warrior. A show I both adored for what it was and rolled my eyes at in other instances. I mean it did give us some great fights and idea likes Hannibal vs. Genghis Khan, or Samurai vs. Viking. However just by sheer context it was going to run into problems; chiefly with the warrior class battles given "Knight" could mean everything from a guy on horseback with thick leather armor and a 'bucket head' helmet to a guy from 600 years later in complex plate armor using a musket.
I did like how they do acknowledge the fights weren't often curbstomps and even if the simulation showed ____ lost, they still won in other instances. I argue with some results at times (I'd argue Knight vs. Pirate go the other way around given their armor testing was really poor, something I am happy to see them improve on), but was still a good show overall.
And yeah, poor Ol' Will took a bad fall in that battle. Realistically if you had a more grown, combat trained, and built woman in Joan's place (like they used for the tests) I do think she'd win on account of better technology; but this was basically a fight between a guy in excellent health and good experience on the battlefield for years upon years to the point people consider "The Conqueror" basically his bleedin' surname against a farmer's teenage daughter who was maybe in her early 20s when she was killed. Joan of Arc, lotta guts, great morale boost tool, not the best fighter.
static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Knightwithsmartphone_894.gif
4850805
4850454
Out of curiosity, what were the geographic and temporal distributions of the four families like? To what degree did they overlap? And, when they did overlap, how were the members of each family specialized differently from one another?
For instance, most of the Coleurosaurs I know of are from the northern continents during the Cretaceous period, while Carnosaurs tended to dominate the Jurassic. That is not to say there were no Carnosaurs in the later Cretaceous period, but to my knowledge they didn't share the same environments as similar sized Coleurosaurs, and were adapted to different hunting strategies and targeted different prey as a result. The Ceratosaurids I've read about tended to be from the southern continents, and many Megalosaurids tended to be from earlier time periods, though this last one I am the least sure about; the Spinosaurids were from later, so it may just be that the specific animals I looked up in the past were simply early examples.
So, if you were to do a break down of the ranges of the four families, bot in terms of where and when they were found, what would the distribution look like? (In broad strokes; I fully expect there to be lots of "exceptions" to be considered.)
4850911
Broad strokes there was some overlap with different member groups have comparable sized individuals at the same time; but it was rare to see two groups have representatives of comparable size at the same place and time. In general one can break it up into three times. Mid-Late Jurassic, Early-Mid Cretaceous, and Late Cretaceous.
Mid-Late Jurassic
Megalosaurids - Rare, but large forms present in Asia, Europe, North America, Africa, and South America. Occupy both roles as apex predators (Torvosaurus) and fish eating forms (first Spinosaurids).
Ceratosaurids - Rare, but present in North America, Europe, and possibly Africa in medium to small forms. When contemporary to Carnosaurs and Megalosaurs, almost always smaller.
Carnosaurs - Large and getting larger forms in Asia, Europe, North America, Africa, and South America. Very big forms like Saurophaganax and Allosaurus compete directly with Megalosaurids and seem to be out-competing them gradually.
Tyrannosaurids/Coleurosaurids - Largely restricted to Asia and Europe with later forms in North America. The first branch the Proceratosauridae, don't grow much bigger than a wolf.
Early-Mid Cretaceous
Megalosaurids - Largely reduced to just Spinosaurids, probably to avoid competition with Carnosaurs, in chiefly Africa, South America, Australia, and presumably Antarctica.
Ceratosaurids - Largely evolved into Abelisaurids chiefly in Africa, India, South America, and likely Antartica and Australia. In areas at the same place and time as Carnosaurs, generally they tend to be medium size at largest.
Carnosaurs - Largely evolved into Carcharodontosaurids (large, robust forms) and Sinraptors (medium, leaner forms) in Africa, North and South America, Asia, and presumably India and Antarctica. Sinraptors go extinct by the end of this phase.
Tyrannosaurids/Coleurosaurids - Slowly growing in size from wolf size to large bear size with one big outlier in Sinotyrannus heralding the gradual rise of large, advanced Tyrannosaurids in Asia and North America contemporary to some Carnosaurs. Group still chiefly in Asia with some in North America and Europe. However the Tyrannosaurids that are getting bigger general aren't found with Carnosaurs or Megalosaurs.
Late Cretaceous
Megalosaurids - Almost certainly extinct due to climate shifts wiping out the Spinosaurids at around 85 mya at latest.
Abelisaurs - Same regions as before. Abundant in mostly medium to a few large forms in the southern continents.
Carnosaurs - Largely extinct either from probably climate shifts, herbivore changes, or competition from Abelisaurs in the south and Tyrannosaurs in the north. The last are possible Carcharodontosaurids in South America and a lone genus, Siats in North America extinct by 85-90mya.
Tyrannosaurids/Coleurosaurids - Range across Europe, Asia, and North America in abundance and reach largest size ever seen before in the group the moment the Carnosaurs are all gone.
* Special note is fellow Coleurosaurids, the Dromaeosaurids (raptors) had most of their biggest representatives such as Utahraptor contemporary to Mid-Cretaceous Carnosaurs in North America. It seems that they and the growing Tyrannosaurids might have competed against the Carnosaurs for food by being more agile and hunting in groups. Think wolves vs. tigers.
4850911
So to give it in annotated form. In the Late Jurassic the Carnosaurs were gradually edging out Megalosaurs for apex predator roles while Ceratosaurs and newcomer Proceratosaurs were largely sidelined into medium and small roles.
By the mid-Cretaceous terrestrial predatory Megalosaurs went extinct with Spinosaurs are last ones, Carnosaurs have only gotten bigger, but now the Ceratosaurs->Abelisaurs are starting to wedge their way into medium-large roles in the south while Proceratosaurs->Tyrannosaurs begin to do the same in the north.
Then by the early late Cretaceous the Spinosaurs are gone, Carnosaurs are extremely rare, and Abelisaurs get more common in the south as Tyrannosaurs get bigger in the north.
And finally at the late Cretaceous proper, it's Abelisaurs in the south and Tyrannosaurs in the north with perhaps some overlap with a few dubious finds in Mexico and Asia.
Look, in general, I try not to get involved in vs. debates. It's just an ugly bit of business to begin with. So, I'm going to weigh in on what your observations make me think about both predators and leave it at that.
So, let's start with the star of this blog, the Giga. The Giga was a large predator, with muscular arms (given their size), could run at high speeds (given its size), and what it lacked in bite force, it made up for in being able to chomp out big chunks of flesh very quickly. This tells me that it was designed to go up against less heavily armored foes with less armor, but were on the agile and muscular side of the spectrum.
Then there's good ol' Rexy. The Rex is very similar in build to the Giga, though slightly more compact, and had a comparatively larger head, leading many to believe it had a bite force that makes most gators look like newborn kittens. This tells me that Rexy typically went up against prey that was more heavily armored, but slightly slower than what the Giga typically hunted.
Ultimately, I agree with what you said about the Rex and the Giga not being able to hunt in each other's territory. They'd be up against the exact wrong type of prey for the type of hunter they are. It's honestly just one of those things that I just don't want to get into a long debate over. Personally, I'll always have a soft spot for the Rex, but I'll always admit there's no such thing as a perfect predator.
4850923
If the dominance of these four families can be dated to the mid-Jurassic, what about the Triassic and early Jurassic periods? I know Dinosaurs as a group evolved in the mid to late Triassic, so other classes would have been top predator before that, but by the late Triassic Dinosaurs would have been well established. Did Theropods as a group not differentiate before that? Is this when early Megalosaurids basically exist uncontested? Or did other, pre-Theropods hold the top position? (I would not be surprised if early crocodilians were serious competition for the Triassic Dinosaurs; their decedents did continue to challenge the later Dinosaurs and continue to be major predators to this day.)
4850948
Oh there certainly were Theropods and you had the predecessors and very early versions of later groups, however Theropods as a whole only really stayed consistently large by the early-middle Jurassic about 175 million years back. In the Triassic and early Jurassic, the group as a whole didn't divide all that much or the divides between future groups were very hard to classify both due to vague features and poor fossil numbers.
While non-theropods certainly did play their fair share, crocodilians as we recognize them didn't really exist until the very end of the Jurassic; replacing earlier "Crocodylomorphs" like Phytosaurs (river dwellers) and Rauisuchids (terrestrial large carnivores). Dinosaurs however were still the top and most common predators.
There were a few debatable Theropod predators before the late Triassic, such as the 18 foot long Herrerasaurus who was either a very early Theropod, or sort of a last member of the divide between Sauropod and Theropod.
After that debatable start, in this case pretty much all the Early Jurassic and Middle to Late Triassic big Theropods were "Coelophysoids". The group is rather poorly defined, but in general they include the likes of Cryolophosaurus, Dilophosaurus, and the recently discovered, Kayentapus. The group is likely either ancestral to or close relatives to the ancestors of the later groups and did grow to a respectable size up 20+ feet as apex predators. In fact Cryolophosaurus seems to almost have a composite of Carnosaur, Ceratosaur, Megalosaur, and Coleurosaur features to the point it was classed as either of each for awhile before nesting it closer to Dilophosaurus and other more primitive theropods.
These predecessors had their heyday at the end of the Triassic and into the Early Jurassic just as the Ceratosaurs and earliest Coleurosaurs seem to have their start. Then the Megalosaurs and Carnosaurs come in and grew large fast to take over. So of the groups Ceratosaurs likely branched off first (either right before or right after Cryolophosaurus' time at 190 mya) but by in large the groups weren't very well defined until 170-165 mya. Before then, especially right after the Triassic extinction, all Theropods were more or less in the same group.
Theropods were in the running for top predators almost as soon as the group existed, really hitting their stride after the terrestrial crocodylomorphs largely kicked the bucket in the Triassic extinction. But they hadn't really diversified to the point one could definitively go "This is group A, this is group B" until about 170 to 165 mya.
*whistles* It's amazing of the variety of sheer predators that we've discovered that existed back then, and your articles Tarb are really informative, so we don't write of these Carnosaurs as just "T-rex knock offs".
Now, as a kid, I will admit I fell into the trend of debating on which monster was the biggest and thus would be the baddest in a fight. When you're a kid, you look at the world in simplistic ways. Now that I'm older, I can see how ridiculous such "fanboy fights" would be in terms of how "bigger" these dinosaurs are compared to the t-rex. It's all really a moot point because any variation could exist between these species, as there were probably millions of these dinos roaming the earth that could be either bigger or smaller than each other.
Take us for example. We have variations upon variations about our physiology that can't really be set in stone, like our height, weight, skin tone, hair color, eye color, etc, so we can't really place a magic bullet on the "exact specifications" of our species. Take for example people with Gigantism. Because of their overactive pituitary glad, they grow far taller then most average people.
), they were perfectly evolved KILLING MACHINES.
The same thing could be said about dinosaurs. Maybe one of them had a pituitary gland tumor, and grew to a bigger height compared to most of it's species. It's hard to narrow down, since all of them are extinct and we have very few specimens to compare.
So, with all these debates on which dinosaur is "better"? It's pretty much a moot point, as anything can go when you count the fact of millions of years of evolution.
I think the important factor to consider about these two Carnosaurs is to ask: Did they do their job of killing and surviving WELL? And as Tarb described (in VIVID detail I might add! BRRRRRRR