Paleontology Species Spotlight: Terrible Claws, yah missed it by 'that' much... · 5:59am Mar 6th, 2016
When people thought of dangerous carnivorous dinosaurs, up until the early 1990s it was always the titans. Huge beasts with massive heads and enormous bodies, like Allosaurus, Saurophaganax, Torvosaurus, and the iconic Tyrannosaurus. We all know the iconic image associated with the mold breaker.
It’s semi-common knowledge at this point that the ‘Velociraptor’ featured in the iconic Jurassic Park series is inaccurate to the real animal, being easily 3-5x larger than the real species which was coyote sized at best. It’s claw is too curved and large, its head is too boxy, and its entire body is too robust.
Well it’s because it’s not a Velociraptor, at all. And the genetic hybridization mentioned in the films is only part of the reason it looks that way. It’s actually a close relative of Veloci hailing for North America, an important species that after being discovered in the 1960s, launched a renaissance in the ways dinosaurs were studied and looked at amongst scientist. Deinonychus antirrhopus, “Balanced Terrible Claws”.
Deinonychus (left) and Velociraptor (right)
Genus: Deinonychus (Dine-na-nye-cus or Die-non-no-cus)
Species: D. antirrhopus
Time: Aptian and Alibian ages, Cretaceous, roughly 115-105 mya
Location: North America
Height: About 4-4.5 feet at head when level. Reared up to around 5-6 feet.
Length: 11-13 feet
Weight: 160-250lbs
Top Speed: Unknown, likely </=35mph
Epidermis: Complex feathers with limited scales (feet & lower legs, latter ½ of snout, hands, and groin)
Weaponry: Bone crushing bite, around 58 double serrated teeth, 4-5 inch recurved claws on feet, 1-2 inch claws on hands
If the Velociraptor genus, V. mongoliensis and V. osmolskae make for a good comparison to a lynx or bobcat, D. antirrhopus was the puma or jaguar. Both animals were members of the Dromaeosaurid family, who are often informally called “Raptors”. The reason I’ll use the proper name here most of the time is because in that’s how it goes in scientific circles. Helps also avoid confusion with the group of modern birds of prey who are also called “Raptors”.
Back to Deinonychus.
Unlike its relatives in Asia, who’d probably regard a human as far too large to see as food, Deinonychus would have no such druthers. In fact we’d actually be just about the right size for an adult. If this animal was contemporary to humans, it would be very, very lethal and see us as food.
Now as I said above, the ‘Raptors’ in Jurassic Park, The Lost World, JP3, and Jurassic World aren’t Velociraptors, they’re Deinonychus (which has the same spelling for plural or singular). True, there are some differences but most of those can be chalked up to creative license and more complete fossils being found over time since 1993. Namely, all the film creatures represent the upper end of how big Deinonychus got, with your average Deinonychus being about a foot shorter and having a few slightly different proportions. Though the top 10% or so of real Deinonychus were big enough to look a tall man in the eye if they stood up a bit and thus were the same size as the JP creatures. InGen got the DNA from a few specimens so maybe they just got lucky and got all upper sized individuals? It be like if you cloned ten different people and by pure chance, all the DNA samples you got were of people over 6 feet tall.
The film and novels also both allude to this fact that the creatures we see are actually Deinonychus and not Velociraptor. In the opening of the first movie, Dr. Grant and Dr. Sattler are uncovering a ‘Velociraptor’ skeleton. However, they are digging up their fossil in Montana, USA. Velociraptor did NOT live in Montana or any part of North America, all of its fossils are from upper China and Mongolia. Wanna know who was discovered in the Cloverly Formation, Montana? Deinonychus.
And when you add in both the fictional and nonfictional word from the books, this truth is pretty much blatantly stated. In the book, Dr. Grant remarks to Tim that, “Deinonychus is considered one of the Velociraptors now.”. Why did he say this? Well it has to deal with what kind of Sci-Fi writer Michael Crichton was. Crichton, while using some outlandish stuff, always tried to base his work in real science and would frequently look up scientific journals and interview experts to try and make his books accurate as he could with artistic license only used once or twice for the sake of storytelling. In many editions of Crichton’s books, you can even find a directory of the works he used. One of the works cited for ‘Jurassic Park’ was a 1980s study of Theropod dinosaurs by a man named George S. Paul.
Paul, in his study, concluded Deinonychus had enough similarities to Velociraptor that it could be a member of the same genus that was just of a different size. This is akin to modern predators, who might have a huge range in size across the same genus. A Siberian Tiger might weigh as much as 850lbs and a Arabian Leopard might weigh as little as 50lbs. And yet, they are both part of the ‘Panthera’ genus, Panthera tigris altaica and Panthera pardus nimr. Since we can't do genealogy studies of dinosaurs like we can to the degree we can do for modern animals, Paul relied on anatomical differences and similarities to make his judgement. And due to the rules of Taxonomy, the earliest name described in a scientific journal takes precedence. Since Velociraptor was named in 1924 and the name Deinonychus showed up in 1969, the former name took priority if the two were put in the same genus. Thus Deinonychus antirrhopus became Velociraptor antirrhopus in Paul’s writing. And Paul wasn’t found to be wrong until just after the book was done and the first movie was wrapping up, so by then it was too late to change it so they just ran with it.
Last bit of evidence that proves we’ve been seeing Deinonychus under a pseudonym all this time? Michael Crichton actually sought out the world’s leading expert on Deinonychus to design and create the feats for the book’s raptors. The man who discovered the species himself, John Ostorm from Yale University. Crichton met with Ostorm several times at Yale and ran question after question by him to try and make the book’s raptors as accurate as possible as they went over the scenes with them. In Ostorm’s own words, “Anything the creatures in Michael’s book could do, Deinonychus could.”. It was afterwards Crichton went with the ‘Velociraptor’ title because he thought it sounded more imposing and, as stated earlier, the most recent and seemingly most accurate data so far suggested that.
So in the spirit of both the late Crichton and Ostorm, let’s run through the Jurassic Park creature’s feats and see how it stacks up to Deinonychus. Now be aware I’ll be primarily using the feats the Raptors pulled off in the books and the first two movies, as those were the ones Crichton and Ostorm had any involvement in. Both men passed away before Jurassic World came out and neither had any real involvement with the third movie.
1. Speed
Deinonychus fits this bill perfectly for the books, though a tad short in the movies. In the movies, both Jurassic Park and Jurassic World state the raptors can get up to “Cheetah speed” (JP) and “40, 50 when they’re hungry.” (JW). Assuming the last quote is talking Miles Per Hour and not Kilometers Per Hour, that is a little over 25% faster than what Deinonychus probably could pull. Deinonychus was a fairly bulky Dromaeosaurid, so it was likely a sprinting ambush predator. Judging from its limb proportions, it was probably a bit slower than an Ostrich, who weigh about the same but have longer legs. Now Deinonychus was by no means slow. Theropod dinosaurs had a special set of muscle linking the upper leg to the hip and base of the tail. As the tail swished back and forth while running, it would help cock back and shoot forward the legs like a springs. Birds don’t have this to the same degree due to shortened tails. So that would help bolster Deinonychus’ top speed a bit. If an Ostrich can sprint at up to 45 mph, Deinonychus likely could move around at around 35mph. This matches up with the books fairly well, were a raptor in ‘The Lost World’ is able to keep up with a dirt bike going over uneven ground. Accounting for a winding path and uneven elevation, that bike was probably going around that speed too. Studies of the inner ear also show Deinonychus had a very good sense of balance, which is necessary to wrestling with prey.
So basically, Deinonychus wasn't a speedster, it was a sprinter and CQB expert.
2. Climbing and Jumping
In the novel version of Jurassic Park, a pack of raptor besiege a bungalow by easily being able to scale the walls or jump up to (or in the case of one unfortunate victim, pounce down from) the one and a half story roof. In the sequel, The Lost World, a high tree platform also gets overrun by a pack that easily is able to jump and climb both the structure and surrounding trees to get to them. In the movies, we see raptors, both from a ground level running start and a standing position, spring a good dozen feet into the air to jump onto roofs and other dinosaurs.
This is entirely accurate to what Deinonychus was capable of. This creature probably lived in dense forests and like leopards, could very likely climb trees quite well. In fact the iconic ‘killing claw’ on the Dromaeosauridae family’s biggest toe probably started as a climbing instrument repurposed for combat. The earliest birds, who are very close relatives, had the same sort of claw. And while its legs weren’t too good for distance running, Deinonychus had some very powerful limbs. This means it was plenty capable of scaling structures and trees, as well as jumping quite high. Since the species has short wings on its arms, it very likely could have done what’s called “Wing Assisted Incline Running”. Often done by modern birds, this is beating the wings in a specific manner while digging their claws into the surface to help propel themselves up a steep incline or flat surface. 
Now Deinonychus’ wings weren’t big enough to fly, but if even chicks and young birds can pull off this maneuver it is very likely it could too. This animal could literally run up the side of a building or tree. Some even think this was one of its attack methods. Scale and jump tree to tree and then figuratively and literally get the drop on its prey. So imagine yourself in a mid-Cretaceous forest, we'll even give you a gun. The canopy of conifers and tree ferns is so thick you can't really even see through it regardless of if its day or you're walking around at night with night vision goggles. You'd hear some slight movement around or above you, but the way sound bounces around in the forest you can't tell which direct its coming from. And then about 220lbs of carnivore drops on you, claws first. You'd have no chance to reaction and would probably be dead or paralyzed before you hit the ground.
3. Biting and Slashing
Here I think it actually a showcase of the novel raptors and IRL Deinonychus actually being more dangerous than the film creatures. Ostrom was convinced the species had a strong bite even before it could be tested and it turned out he was likely 100% right when he told Crichton such. Deinonychus had a pair of incredibly powerful jaws. We’re talking stronger than any modern mammalian predator and being only equaled by the larger sharks and crocodiles. A 2010 study of Deinonychus’ bite based off tooth marks found in the bones of an animal a Deinonychus had been eating showed an average bite force of around 6,700 newtons with an upper end at 8,200 newtons, based on how deeply the teeth marks cut into the bone. For comparison, your average lion has around 3,500 newtons bite force. The only mammalian predator with a force near that of Deinonychus is the Spotted Hyena. The land predator with the closest chomp to Deinonychus is the American Alligator, who can bite down with enough force to shatter limbs and crush turtles whole. And these were feeding bites from the Deinonychus, not full on crunches. Considering Theropods constantly replaced their teeth, they'd be more inclined to use all their bite force to make the kill than a mammalian carnivore would. So it’s maximum bite force was probably even higher then the gauged 6,700 newtons and the species’ boxy head probably was that way to to absorb the force.
In the movies, we never really got a gauge of how hard the raptors could bite down, with more attention given to the claws. In the books we get examples of the animals biting through sheet metal and crushing skulls. So we can assume that bite force is there, just not used. The point stands though. If a Deinonychus bit you on the arm, its teeth would knife your your tissue and muscle and the force behind them would shatter your bones. It could de-limb you in one bite.
Now the claws are a bit of a mixed bag. Dromaeosaurids, unlike Jurassic Park’s animals, didn’t use those big claws like blades for disemboweling and slashing. They could in theory do so, but the prevailing theory now based off their robustness and strong anchoring is that they were instead used as stabbing weapons. Against similarly sized and smaller prey, to impale, pin down by the torso or stab into the throat. We actually see an example of this sort of claw use both in modern predatory birds and in a fossil of a Velociraptor and its prey, a Protoceratops, who died locked in combat. The Velociraptor has one claw stabbed into the Protoceratops’ chest, and the other impaled into the neck. Against larger animals, those big toe claws were used to anchor the Deinonychus onto the side after jumping on and attacking with its jaws and forelimbs. It was the forelimbs on Deinonychus, which had thinner, more blade-like claws that probably did the slashing.
So think of those big toe claws as less bladed sickles and more like a multi-use tool that’s a mix of a climbing spike, grappling hook, and meat hook.
4. Intelligence and pack hunting
Now I’ll say it outright, the movie raptors are unrealistically smart. We get dialogue for them in the third movie that states they are smarter than dolphins and primates. That’s...kiiiinda bull. They were far from dumb however. Let me explain.
In reptiles we have a very distinct family that arose in late Permian period and ascended to prominence in the Triassic. This family called the ‘Archosaurs’ (Ruling Reptiles) are very distinct from other reptiles like lizards, snakes, and turtles due to their biology. They have a more complex nervous system, four chambered hearts, larger brains, and a different limb set up. When the Permian extinction decimated the group’s rivals, the Mammal-like Therapsid reptiles, this group took over in the Triassic and kept it that way till the Cretaceous, occupying the major ecological niches. Crocodilians took over the water, Dinosaurs rose up on land, and Pterosaurs took to the skies.
The reason I bring this up is recent brain studies on many types of Theropod dinosaurs. Some of these studies showed a similar brain size to those of Crocodilians and people concluded, “Oh, it’s not like birds so obviously it means they were kinda dumb because crocodiles must be dumb right?.”. Well to not beat around the bush, that’s BS. This is a case of people making assumptions that because crocodilians look more like lizards, they "must" be more primitive than more "evolved" Archosaurs like birds. That is simply not true. Remember how I said more complicated brains were a trait of ALL Archosaurs? Well a big factor in that is that brain size =/= intelligence, as many studies with modern day Crocodilians show us. Crocodilians have recently been found to be capable of many behaviors once thought exclusive to birds and mammals. Complicated nesting behaviors, monogamy, group cooperation, and even tool use have been recently discovered. Several species, such as American Crocodiles, Indian Gavials, and American Alligators have been positively documented to be able to pull off pack hunting, herding together schools of fish much like dolphins have been found to do. Nile Crocodiles have long been thought to just swarm over animals crossing the river in a mob much like Komodo Dragons, however recent studies have shown proof positive that the crocs will knowingly team up with each other. Some will grab and hold down the large prey’s limbs while another goes for the kill blow on the belly or neck. They will then start taking turns having a bite while the others hold the food. All while being very careful not to hit each other, unlike Komodos who frequently will gang up on each other in a mob. This isn't mob behavior, it's pack hunting.
And in a very Jurassic Park-escue manner, a pair of Cuban Crocodiles tried to ambush their zookeeper at a wildlife park. One croc distracted them while another snuck up behind them in the underbrush (not attacking from the water because the keeper wouldn’t get near that). What is this starting to remind you of? I'll save you the thought.
It thankfully was thwarted by another keeper seeing the second crocodile coming, but this is pretty complex pack behavior. Easily some of the most complex seen in a large carnivore. Adding to this intelligence is Alligators and Mugger Crocodiles being the first known reptiles to use tools. They will seek out specific types of branches and twigs used to nesting material for the local birds, and then carefully balance it on their snouts while hiding the rest of their body, with the intent being luring in and grabbing any bird that comes by. Let me repeat all this, they are smart enough to use pack hunting, tools, and setting traps. And all this from animals’ whose brains are less than 0.5% of their body mass. For comparison, most Dromaeosaurids and their relatives the Troodontids had large brains with more folds. Their problem solving intelligence and coordination was likely even more complex because of this and the fact they did live in groups.
So was Deinonychus as smart as a chimpanzee or dolphin? Probably not. Was it dumb? Ah hell no! Judging from both modern predatory birds and crocodilians, I would say Deinonychus had comparable intelligence to most mammalian predators and probably was smarter than many of them. The closest comparison I’d draw is to the Spotted Hyena. Hyenas are quite smart, able to pull off complex pack hunting coordination and problem solving to an even greater degree than canines and felines. And yes, like the movie raptors, Spotted Hyenas can figure out how to open doors and are notorious escape artists in zoos and captivity. Despite a lack of usable forelimbs, one tamed Spotted Hyena named Solomon was infamous around town for breaking out of his enclosure and going through walks across town to the pub (where the owner fed him cheese).
And this is the sort of intelligence I think IRL Deinonychus had and the type demonstrated in the books. Not huge cognitive intelligence, but a lot of cunning and problem solving intelligence. They wouldn’t have a complex language like in JP3, but it was likely smarter than the average bear (or dog or cat for that matter). So in this respect, the ‘Raptor Squad’ being semi-tame and trained in Jurassic World is quite accurate to Deinonychus. Spotted Hyenas, predatory bird, and Crocodilians have been tamed and trained in a similar manner.
So in a nutshell, Deinonychus was probably plenty smart and cunning as far as predators go, just in a different way than we often think of in terms of intelligence. We also got fossil evidence of Dromaeosaurids moving in groups, so family clans are likely. As for pack hunting vs. solo hunting, like hyenas they probably could do both just fine.
Now I’m going to address I know someone will bring up. What’s the deal with the feathers? This I’ll give both Jurassic Park the novel and Jurassic Park the movie a pass on this as at the time, we didn’t really know which species had scales and which had feathers. In-universe it's explained by them using outside DNA (mostly crocodilians and frogs) in the gene coding, which switched off the feather genes. However by 2016, we’ve gotten numerous skeletal evidence and epidermal impressions from Dromaeosaurids to say definitively, yes ALL of them have feathers. We even know most species, Deinonychus included, had wings on their arms because they had what are called ‘quill knobs’ on the arm bones. These are small bumps and depressions in the bone for muscle attachment associated with large feathers. And sure enough, the related species we got complex epidermal impressions for, have wings on the arms and complex feathers on 90% of the body.
If you saw a Deinonychus IRL, it probably would look more like a long tailed, toothy eagle walking around on the ground.
If you want to see a case of this in media, the steam game “Primal Carnage” and “Primal Carnage: Extinction” have a fictional species that again is a Deinonychus doppleganger, called ‘Novaraptor’. Novaraptor has multiple ‘skins’ players can use, many of which that include a full coat of feathers that is quite accurate to the modern day reconstructions of Deinonychus.
As for Deinonychus’ color? Probably mottled browns and bronze hues similar to types of modern birds of prey and mammalian predators. Bright colors could be present in theory, but would be counter productive for an ambush predator. It might have had stripes or spots as well. To use the Novaraptors again, Deinonychus probably was most like this.
So there you have it. Deinonychus, the animal everyone knows but not by name.
More trivia!
1. Daptosaurus
Deinonychus was actually ‘discovered’ about 30 years before it actually was. The first fossils were recovered in Montana by a Barnum Brown, a world famous paleontologist who previously discovered Tyrannosaurus rex in 1902. Brown found several fossils while working in the region in 1931. It seemed to be of a small carnivore he found near the skeleton of a hippo sized hadrosaur called Tenotosaurus. Brown dubbed the creature based off the bones he could recover, and named it Daptosaurus agilis due to the bones seemingly coming from a nimble creature. The majority of the fossils were encased in a thick, limestone sheet that he had difficulty working through, so he never formally published the discovery. It would be three decades later that John Ostorm would be in the same region and make his discovery. It would be even longer before people realized Daptosaurus and Deinonychus were one and the same, however because the name ‘Deinonychus’ was used in a formal paper and Daptosaurus had fallen into obscurity; Ostorm’s name won out.
2. “And Crichton comes in 2nd.”
Jurassic Park and the novel it was based on weren’t the first popular dinosaur stories featuring Deinonychus. Deinonychus had appeared in several documentaries beforehand, but most notably was it’s entry in the novel “Carnosaur” by Harry Adam Knight. Written several years before Jurassic Park, the basic premise has some similarities. Instead of a theme park in Central America, we got a reclusive billionaire operating a private menagerie in rural England who’s been cloning dinosaurs with plans to rewild them in remote corners of the world. Like Jurassic Park, the novel and film, Carnosaur’s plot kicks up from its resident Dromaeosaurid breaking out and killing people across rural England. In this case the first time we get a look at the creature is when it attacks a ranch, mauling a horse and ranch hand. Unlike Crichton though, Knight correctly dubbed the offending creature a Deinonychus; as when he wrote the story it was Deinonychus (though still obscure) who was more well known than Velociraptor.
Like Jurassic Park, Carnosaur got a movie adaptation the author loved. Unlike Jurassic Park, the film, whose development Crichton was heavily involved in as he was close friends with Steven Speilberg; even helping with the screenplay; Knight however signed off film rights and never heard from the studio again. Crichton loved the film Jurassic Park for its awesome effects and respect for the source material. Knight however loved the film Carnosaur for some “So Bad, It’s Good” riffing and how unlike his novel it ended up being.
I have read the novel Carnosaur, and outside of some rather out of place sex scenes (WTF Knight?!), it’s pretty damn good. Good suspense, neat horror, and its setting in the UK means we got to see the final breakout scene occur all over London. Knight also used some pretty obscure dinosaur species. For instance the main two ‘antagonist’ dinosaurs are the Deinonychus and, surprisingly not using Tyrannosaurus rex, but Tarbosaurus bataar* as the main threatening big Theropod.
The movie only had two dinosaurs in it (as oppose to the book’s dozen or so). Deinonychus was one of the two and was the primary threat for most of the film, however the animal was never named on-screen. Though ironically enough it had a bigger kill count that the Tyrannosaurus (the other dino). Sadly the sequels (how the f*** did this thing get-) followed the JP bandwagon and retitled its Dromaeosaurids as “Velociraptors”.
*granted now it’s debated if Tarbosaurus and Tyrannosaurus are the same genus, which would make the animal in the book, Tyrannosaurus bataar; but at the time of Knight’s writing they were definitely thought of as separate.
4. They almost fixed it in a bad movie we never saw
Jurassic Park’s fourth movie was in and out of development hell for 13 flippin’ years. One script pitch that almost got made was one by John Sayles, actually getting as far as the late stages of Pre-Production. Interestingly, some of the elements in the script still persist into Jurassic World despite an otherwise complete rework. One such element that carried over was a pack of semi-tamed raptors. Now the script itself (which you can actually read online here) is… weeiirrrd. I might do a summary of it one day because it is so strange it’s kinda entertaining to me. Ironically having more similarities to Carnosaur (the novel) than Jurassic Park, it actually does correctly identify its version of the Raptor Squad as a group of Deinonychus. Now we don’t know if this is them correcting the previous films dubbing of the raptors as Deinonychus, or if this group is specifically Deinonychus and thus considered different from the first three movie’s dinosaurs; but it is kinda interesting.
5. Catalyst for a Scientific Renaissance
Deinonychus has a very important role in Paleontology because its discoverer John Ostrom and his student Robert Bakker launched what’s called the “Dinosaur Renaissance”. This was a shift in thinking of dinosaurs as slow, plodding behemoths; to intelligence, active, and complex animals. And the crux of this was Ostorm’s groundbreaking comparison of his newly discovered Deinonychus to early birds like Archaeopteryx. He found so many similarities between the two that Deinonychus became the complete opposite of what carnivorous dinosaurs were thought of as being. Without Ostorm, Bakker, and this big clawed killing machine; our entire modern view of dinosaurs would have taken far longer to occur. Franchises like Jurassic Park might have never even have happened.
So I propose a toast. To our mis-dubbed star Deinonychus. You changed science and gave us a kick ass movie even if nobody got your name right and got you and your kid brother mixed up.
Thanks a lot Tarbtano for making the JP Scientists sounding like total Retards
3793683
Eh, I think of it as just a case of alternate universe. Maybe in their in-universe timeline the mistake of putting Deinonychus and Velociraptor in the same genus never got changed around. So they still think they are the same genus and Paul never got refuted.
If I could like blog posts, I would. I can't, so have a
3793713 Thanks buddy, tis the thought that counts
Gotta say Tarb, I'm liking these dinosaur blog posts. You really know your stuff. ^_^
As a fan of reptiles, I think I squeed a bit from reading this.
Tarbosaurus? That name sounds familiar... ^_^
There should be a way to save these posts as faves or for later reading, like the fics.
3793820
My pleasure. Talking about these sort of things is something I simply love doing and helps me decompress after exam study.
TARBosaurus + tiTANOsaurus
And now you know were my username came from.
3793831
Neat! Another mystery solved. ^_^
3793821
Agreed. I've come across plenty of fascinating blog posts, and it'd be great to have them available for quick access.
Fun fact: around the time the first JP movie came out, Spielberg admitted he enlarged almost all of the dinosaurs in the movie by about 25% for dramatic purposes. This would be the real life explanation for the larger then normal sizes. Curiously, there was one dinosaur that was actually reduced in size for this movie instead. Can you guess which one?
3793916 Actually the 25% he was talking about was mostly camera work. For instance JP's Tyrannosaurus is about the same size as the current record was at the time and the Triceratops was actually a tad small. However the one you're referring to is the 'Dilophosaurus', who is about 1/4th the size it should be. This was done to avoid confusion with the Deinonychus and for the surprise something so small is still lethal. Movie material actually lists the Dilo at the proper size, so it's general assumed the one we saw in the movie was just a juvenile.
You sure they're Deinonychus? Seems too big for that. I thought it was Achillobator
4.bp.blogspot.com/-NbpKrvU0fNQ/UaZecgIyMeI/AAAAAAAAAPI/5lknAKj3C2g/s1600/Achillobator_scale.png
Granted, Deinonychus makes more sense given where they are digging and Deinonychus is mentioned in the book, but there's a rather large size disparity between an animal that is a 160 lbs sopping wet and the behemoths in the movies.
3794619
As I stated earlier, the JP raptors actually do overlap with what is considered the upper-end (so like the top 10%) of Deinonychus size, which was roughly the same size as your smaller Achillobators. It's like how Lions (Achillobator) are bigger than Jaguars (Deinonychus), but the largest Jaguars are the same size as your average Lion. I'll post the image again for you to see. According to the official stats for the JP raptors, they are about 14 feet long and 260-300lbs. This lines up exactly with an above average and "freak" sized Deinonychus, which had an identical length and weight. Achillobator by comparison was about 3-6 feet longer and 200lbs heavier.
vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/reptiles/images/3/34/Hypothetical_Deinonychus_size_range.png/revision/latest?cb=20130721170604
The scale you have is a bit of an optical illusion. It has the JP raptor standing up on its tippy toes with its legs perfectly straight and neck raised, making it look much taller than it actually is if it were in the same pose as the real animals below. Gimmie a sec to edit the picture to show you what I mean.
And you also have to look back to the context of when the novel was being written. We had fewer fossils of Deinonychus at the time and the ones we did have fairly complete finds of were quite large. So at the time, people though Deinonychus had a larger average size than we know it did now.
I'm glad I'm getting back into dinosaurs, Tarb. Deinonychus is something of a favorite of mine.
I am given to understand that Dromaeosaurs had intelligence on par with modern Corvids. I am unsure how accurate this is, but I was once given the impression that other, larger theropods were closer in intelligence to the single most common local bird in my area. Regrettably, due to a protected nesting site just off shore, the afore-mentioned most common bird is the local variety of seagull. Watching a flock of gulls on the ground going after a choice bit of food, according to one of my old teachers, would be somewhat like a group of carnosaurs trying to share a corpse. I suspect he was... misinformed. Your thoughts on this?
3794619
Here you go. I imported in the average and above average Deinonychus skeletons from my picture and scaled them to your's after tweaking the JP raptor's stance.
http://tinypic.com/r/2s8pt79/9
i68.tinypic.com/2s8pt79.png
3794725
Well when we talk about Theropods, behavior and intelligence was probably all over the spectrum. For instance Carnosaurs like Allosaurus and Saurophaganax had more primitive features and Crocodilian-like brains than Coelurosaurids like Tyrannosaurus and Deinonychus, who's brains had more bird-like features and sharper senses such as binocular vision and strong smell. I could see some of the Jurassic Carnosaurs and Abelisaurs having more mobbing behavior because we are fairly certain they were solitary animals and would only be in the same place to mate or a chance food source. From what we can gander about Dromaeosaurids and their cousins the Troodontids and Tyrannosaurids, they lived (though not necessarily always hunted in) family groups, so we'd expect less mob behavior with them.
So the seagull comparison I think it, quite a bit off. If you wanted a closer comparison for a solitary large Theropod, I'd use the more solitary crocodilians or birds of prey. For the more advanced species, a good comparison would probably be the more coordinated crocodilians (Cuban Crocs, American Alligaors, Nile Crocs) and several types of more ground dwelling, semi-social birds like Caracaras and Seriemas, both of which do occasionally live in family groups and are smart enough to be trained.
So if you wanted my closest amalgamation to get something that behaved like a large Dromaeosaurid, it be a move of Corvids, Nile Crocodiles, and Spotted Hyenas. Not quite super intelligent in regards to how we think of intelligence with apes, but very clever and having good grasp on problem solving intelligence.
This is no offense intended to your professor mind you, it's just updated information. Until 10 years ago, most Paleontologists and even most Biologist thought that if a dinosaur showed signs of being like a crocodile, that meant it was stupid because they thought crocodilians were stupid. Now, we know better.
3794726 Ah, yup. The raptors look a lot bigger most of the time because they have their heads cocked up, but they're definitely smaller than they look
vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/jurassicpark/images/d/de/Sam-Neill-encounters-velo-001.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20120702171322
My mistake on that. The Jurassic World raptors look bigger though
blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/files/2015/06/raptors.jpg
Not sure if it's a case of difference in height in the actors, but the raptors seem to get bigger in every movie. If I'm not mistaken, the JW raptors have a boxier head and body in comparison to the others.
3793831 Huh, I've always wondered about that!
Also, to throw my own sizes into this...
i.imgur.com/P2Uw7.jpg
Like Tarb says, it's because they're reared up that they look taller than they really are. Place them in the same post most size charts place dinosaurs, and they're pretty much in the size range for a Deinonychus.
3794783 Actually, interestingly enough, but this male from the second movie seems smaller than average!
jplegacy.org/jpencyclopedia/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Stick-Stupid.png
jplegacy.org/jpencyclopedia/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Stripes.png
In fact, he has to stand on a ledge just to look Jeff Goldblum in the eye!
jplegacy.org/jpencyclopedia/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Gotcha.png
And the JP/// Raptors in that picture you posted seem to be about average Raptor size.
I think that the JW Raptors just seem more bulky than your average Raptor. Makes sense seeing as they're kept well fed and probably don't get a whole lot of running space. Also, keep in mind that Chris Pratt is crouching slightly in that picture, and isn't standing straight up.
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With many Dinosaurs, the males tended to be smaller then the females. Also, as wild animals, the JP2 Dinosaurs would have been a mix of ages, so that animal might have been slightly immature.
As to the Raptor Squad from JW, the new coloration alone is an indication that these animals were "tweaked" on the genetic level for certain traits. If said traits included more muscle for greater strength, more fat reserves for better endurance/ superior ability to go for extended periods between feedings, or even a thicker hide to improve bullet resistance*, then the result would be a bulkier animal. That's probably what we're seeing.
(* Yes, bullet resistance. Between thickness of hide and subdermal fat, a large bear can easily ignore rifle rounds that would be a near match for high end military antipersonnel weapon rounds. Seriously, there are confirmed reports of grizzlies getting shot multiple times with 30-06 rifles at close range and the bullets not even reaching muscle. Since the Raptor Squad was intended for military use, then this level of resistance would be desirable as well as achievable. Kind of explains why Owen was using a rifle that fired (if I'm right about the ammo shown; I'm no expert) 40-70 rounds, likely hot loads at that. Those can take down an elephant, not to mention any bear that ever lived.)
YES! Another Paleo Profile! What's the next one? Could you do Kaprosuchus?
3795522 I doubt their skin was given much thickness. Even the Indominus's flesh was pierced rather easily by some random rods, and that was considerably further into the weapons program than the raptors.
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It wasn't like those sharp pieces of metal were just pressed into her buddy. Those rods pierced her flesh after she got slammed into a building by a charging 9 ton Tyrannosaurus rex. That is considerably more force at play than even sniper rifle bullets and even then, the rods only dug into her skin and didn't punch through the muscle. We had previously seen the I.rex completely unfazed by both Owen and the InGen Mercs hitting it multiple times with high caliber rounds (in Owen's case he emptied over a whole clip).
Bullets meant to kill humans aren't really all that effective on large animals, especially ones with body armor. Even modern crocodiles are often effectively bulletproof to all but very high caliber rounds at close range. Now apply that to an animal easily 15-20x the mass of the croc.
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It also doesn't help that those who are used to shooting mammals (and especially humans) tend to think shooting the head with a sufficiently powerful gun is an instant kill. With crocodilians and the larger theropods (and dinosaurs in general) this is a lot less true. After all, compared to the size of the skull, they had very small brains. In other words, a headshot would be very unlikely to actually kill one.
As for the body, there is a thick hide, often with bony scutes, backed by thick, dense muscle. For a round intended to kill a man- sized or deer-sized target, this is often more mass then they are intended to pierce. There is a reason the man sized and larger theropods could generate so much force while attacking their prey: they needed to in order to inflict enough damage to kill their target.
The 40-70 government round was intended to be able kill any target found in North America when it was developed as a black powder cartridge... including Bison and Brown Bears. Fully loaded with modern nitrocellulose and fired from a sufficiently reinforced gun, it can get a kill shot on an elephant. This would be enough to put down a Raptor... but not either of the rexes. Owen's only chance of really contributing would be if he was lucky enough to hit an artery. Even then, it would take far too long to kill the I.rex; one would need something like an antivehicle .50 BMG rifle to stand a chance of reaching a vital organ.
3796589 You're referring to the movie Rexes, right? Because that gun would certainly kill the real T-rex. Killing a real T-rex would be no different from killing an elephant.
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If the shot was properly placed, yes it would do the job. The thing is, there's a big difference between "hitting the skull hard enough to have bone fragments sprawl off and hit the brain" and "pass between the ribs to reach the lungs or (if very lucky) the heart."
In both cases, you would be firing from short range (under 10 meters) to finish off the animal. Damaging or destroying the brain is an instant kill on a mammal. Damaging the lungs on a T.rex would take a bit longer to kill. Long enough for the Dino to kill the shooter.
On the other hand, a .600 nitro, .700 nitro, or a .50 BMG rifle could kill a T.rex from greater range. The first two have been banned for decades (elephants are protected, and these are rounds intended specifically to hunt elephants) while the .50 BMG is a top level anti-equipment round which is illegal to directly use on human beings according to the Geneva Conventions; they see service as anti armor rounds. To reiterate: for a quick, relatively safe kill on a multi-ton theropod, the weapon of choice is one used to take down aircraft and light to medium armored vehicles. To put it another way, a round that can shoot a driver through the engine block of as truck.
3796666 Why would the T-rex take longer to kill than the elephant? They're around the same size, and the T-rex is more like a giant bird than a reptile, so I doubt it'll be packing osteoderms or the like. Birds aren't really well known for their ability to survive injuries either. T-rexes did survive some gnarly wounds, but so far as I can tell, none of them were to vital areas(though they tore out rather large chunks of flesh)
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One, yes, they likely did have osteoderms. Two, birds are very fragile due to the massive amount of specialized adaption needed for flight; any dense structures and thick hides were sacrificed for being light enough to get off the ground. Three, killing an elephant fast with a heavy bullet to the skull is relatively easy because irreversible loss of brain function is the very definition of death. Elephants have large, easy to locate and shoot brains. T.rex had a very small brain that was surrounded by many thick bony structures. One would need to know exactly where in that massive skull to shoot, be able to do so from the right angle, and be lucky enough to get through. In short, at the cost of advanced memory and cognitive potential, the T.rex was far harder to kill.
3796734 What evidence is there for Trex having osteoderms? The only skin impressions we've seen have shown skin more akin to the feet of birds, and given Yutyrannus, probably some fluff as well. The osteoderm possessing theropods are long away from T-rex, that being Carnotaurus and Ceratosaurus.
My point about birds isn't how fragile they are in regards to being damaged to begin with, it's whether or not they have any kind of impressive resilience that would allow them to survive a lung shot or organ damage in the way you are describing. That has not been affected by the adaptations for flight, and even in birds that walk about on the ground, they are still considered "soft" prey. To quote an article on hunting ostriches
"Aim point when hunting ostrich is dead center on the body; he is soft and if he does not drop to the shot, he should not go far."
I understand that obviously you'd need a higher caliber for the T-rex than for an ostrich, but I don't see where this mythical endurance plays in. A shot to the chest from an elephant type gun should be devastatingly effective regardless. It might take a few shots, but no more than it would take for a large elephant, which are not necessarily an easy headshot regardless. Again, to quote a hunting article
"To hit an elephant's brain is not so easy as it seems, for it is very small in proportion to the amount of bone surrounding it. One must know exactly where the brain lies and endeavour to cut an imaginary line passing through the centre of it, for no two shots can ever be obtained at precisely the same angle.
The brain lies fairly low and back, and the ear orifice is a good index to its position."
"A direct frontal shot is very difficult, and in the case of an animal standing in this position it would be advisable to wait for a better opportunity."
While on the note of hunting elephants, poachers with AK-47s and .30 caliber rounds don't seem to have much trouble killing elephants, so I'm not 100% certain that you'd need a .50 caliber round to take down a T-rex since I doubt that the poachers are carefully lining up their headshots.
3796793 First off, the sheer thickness of the skin and muscle needed to support this large an animal prevents deep penetration. The skin impressions you mentioned show scally skin, which birds largely abandoned to reduce weight for flight; some scaling is left around the feet, but most of their skin is fairly soft and easy to pierce compared to that of reptiles.
Poachers use the death of one thousand cuts to bring down elephants; inflict enough wounds and hang back to allow it to bleed to death. Since there is evidence that the T.rex could recover from massive injuries that would kill an elephant, it's likely that strategy would be less effective.
Again, it comes down to shot placement. T.rex had better protection with the arrangement of it's ribs, so even a chest shot was more likely to deflect off of bone. Also, the T.rex may well have been faster then a modern elephant, so the likelihood of getting away after shooting it would be lower. Finally, the 40-70 is a short range round; it loses energy far to quickly to be used at longer range. Indeed, the one .40-70 gun I've ever seen for sale was a revolver, not a rifle. This is why I suggested the far more powerful .600 nitro, .700 nitro, or the still produced and available .50 BMG. If you wanted to hunt a large dinosaur with a civilian weapon, I would suggest looking at the .44 magnum, and having your will written out in advance. A 12 gage shotgun at close range should be useful against all but the largest Dromaeosaurs, but would likely only annoy anything massing over a metric ton.
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Fossil skin impressions of a Tarbosaurus' thoratic region (side of upper neck and shoulder) showed different sized scales similar to those found on the neck and flank region of crocodilians. While they probably didn't have full on back scutes, large Tyrannosaurids did have a scaly coat over at least most of their body that would have offered great defense against both blunt force and piercing attacks. And Tarbosaurus is much closer in both size and relation to Tyrannosaurus than Yutyrannus is.
The closest mammalian equivalent would be the subdermal armor Ground Sloths had, which made them virtually impervious to injury from spears and arrows. Some loon back in the 1800s even shot at some preserved sloth hide from a relative of Mylodon and the then 10,000 year old skin caught the bullet like Kevlar.
It's not necessarily a matter of bullets punching through as it is them punching through to actually do any real damage. If they get stopped in the upper layers of the muscle or don't even get in that far, you might as well not did anything.
3796904 From what I understand, it's the bony plates that are the real defensive trump card in crocodiles and not the thicker scales. The thicker scales are nice to be sure, but it's not quite the kind of protection that would be implied by T-rex sized crocodile armor.
3796872 Are scales that much of a game changer? Unless it's the bulky kind, they don't seem like they're significantly different in terms of stopping power from simple hide.
Poachers do tend to wildly fire and hits lots of elephants as a result, but nevertheless, while small guns like that aren't ideal, they can definitely do the job in a relatively rapid pace, and not just by bleeding them out either. While a T-rex can recover from punishment, so can elephants, given they've survived land mines blasting off entire limbs.
Funny you mention the 12 gauge, that's apparently another common poacher tool that drops elephants in 3-7 bullets according to this
http://cmsdata.iucn.org/downloads/ssc_op_045.pdf
Granted, it's mentioned they're using special ammo for it, but still. T-rex is slightly better armored than an elephant in some respects, it's more poorly armored in others(notably the fact that an elephant taking damage to the leg is far less crippling). Also, while a straight headshot on a T-rex would be super difficult, one from the side shouldn't be too difficult since it would be far easier to locate the brain.
3796954
Nope. Thick scales can do the same job as well. Crocodiles have survived everything from gun shots to harpoons to the sides about as well as they did the back. And that body armor on the ground sloths I mentioned? Effectively subdermal scales with minimal bone. Scales can offer good protection from lower caliber bullets. As for brain hits (primary method to poach elephants is either brain shot or just riddling them with bullets and hope they bleed to death), that be a good deal harder on a Tyrannosaurus both due to a larger and more reinforced skull that had much more muscle mass than an elephants. Along with a smaller brain to actually hit, this means to all but very high caliber rounds (much larger than most hunters or poachers could use), there would be almost no such thing as a 1-shot-1-kill with a big theropod. Heart shots would also be much harder due to theropods have a doubled ribcage. They'd be bullet sponges.
If you need an idea to demonstrate this, look at bear hunting. Bears are successfully hunted many times, but there have been many, many cases of large boars (bear and wild hog) soaking up ludicrous amounts of bullets because their fat and muscle mass kept the bullets from ever even hitting their bones. And when the bullets did hit bone, they'd be decelerated enough they bounced off. Now apply that to an animal about 20x the wild boar or bear's mass, with a much denser muscle structure, harder bones, and tougher hide.
What Jacen and I are saying is that is isn't impossible to gun down a theropod, just that it actually be much harder than some people would realize. If a 20 foot man-eating croc named Gustav can survive everything from being shot full auto, to harpooned, to grenade'd, to fights with a hippo; I think a 44 foot T.rex be significantly harder to take down. It's do-able, just sure as hell not easy and requiring some big equipment and optimally more than one hunter.
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Agreed. Plus, as for a lethal headshot, my understanding is just about the only angle to actually hit the brain without glancing off the thick bone of the skull is from above, not from the side or in front.
Frankly, the only way you could get a reliable one-hit kill aiming at a T.rex's head would be to aim for it's open mouth... with a grenade launcher. Otherwise, you need a round that can punch through bone aimed at the major organs in the body cavity, or to be profoundly lucky and get a round between the ribs.
As for using large numbers of smaller bullets, there are bone-deep injuries on T.rex fossils that show signs of healing and which indicate the animal suffered wounds that would kill an elephant outright. This is proof positive that the T.rex was better able to handle wound trauma then similar sized mammals. Since this is also true of other large dinosaurs, then it is not a feature exclusive of T.rex, but rather a result of a common evolutionary pressure: the amount of damage predators could inflict. Look again at the bite power of the smaller predator the above entry is about. This is what Dinosaurs evolved to survive and recover from. Mammals survived that time period by avoiding predators, not by recovering from their attacks. Ergo, killing dinosaurs would be harder then killing mammals.