- Lars Schmitz
Today brings: VAMPISAURS! Ok, not really, but it IS about nocturnal predatory dinosaurs.
Paleontologists have generally believed that dinosaurs were active only during the day, preserving their energy at night, when mammals hunted and ate. But an analysis of dinosaur eye structure shows that at least some dinosaurs functioned quite capably in the dark.
Scientists looked at the eye structure of 33 dinosaurs, and “nine of the species, all small carnivores, had eyes that were characteristic of living nocturnal animals”.
But we already KNEW that… I mean that dilophosaurus killed Nedry at night. Actually all the good predatory scenes took place at night. So yeah. More here and here.
Thanks, Slog-tipper Brad!
Neat-o.
neat-o indeed.
And I really enjoy when Slog blatantly reveals itself as a medium fit for 12 year olds. The other posts with their big scary adult words like Democrat, Republican, City Council, New York Times, it’s like c’mon guys, your brief “analyses” almost rival the level of recess blather going on behind a softball team’s dugout.
I can see this information being used in the sequel to Avatar …
Wait, paleontologists thought dinos were generally diurnal? That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Where there’s a niche, there’s an animal, and I seriously doubt reptiles were not up to moving into those niches, leaving them for mammals. We need some more behavioral biologists in the paleo world (although I imagine studying dino behavior would be somewhat … dead.)