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Course: American Museum of Natural History > Unit 1
Lesson 2: How do scientists study dinosaurs?- Where in the world did dinosaurs live?
- Where in the world did dinosaurs live?
- Did dinosaurs travel in herds or packs?
- Did dinosaurs travel in herds or packs?
- How fast were dinosaurs?
- Were dinosaurs warm-blooded?
- Were dinosaurs warm-blooded?
- How fast did dinosaurs grow, and how long did they live?
- How fast did dinosaurs grow, and how long did they live?
- What was dinosaur skin like?
- What color were extinct dinosaurs?
- What color were extinct dinosaurs?
- What were the biggest and smallest dinosaurs?
- Did dinosaurs fight?
- How did dinosaurs reproduce?
- How intelligent were dinosaurs?
- New research points to dinosaurs' colorful past
- New dinosaur research: Microraptor's feather color revealed
- Quiz: How do scientists study dinosaurs?
- Exploration Questions: How do scientists study dinosaurs?
- Answers to Exploration Questions: How do scientists study dinosaurs?
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Did dinosaurs travel in herds or packs?
Since living birds are living dinosaurs, we know that modern dinosaurs often travel in flocks, exhibiting a complex social structure. But did extinct, non-avian dinosaurs do the same? Over the last several decades, numerous claims have been made that they did, but finding unequivocal evidence of herding in the fossil record is difficult.
Trackways
The most definitive evidence comes from sequences of fossilized footprints called trackways. Several track sites have now been found that suggest herding behavior in some groups of dinosaurs. At the Davenport Ranch site outside San Antonio, Texas, R. T. Bird of AMNH discovered an amazing set of sauropods tracks in 1940. Detailed analyses of these trackways reveal a herd of 23 sauropods rambling over muddy ground at a pace of about 2 meters per second. The pattern of overlapping tracks indicates that the largest adult sauropods led the herd, followed by smaller individuals.
Other trackways in Colorado and Korea show herds of large sauropods moving side-by-side in a horizontal front. At one site in Colorado, the animals' paths undulate from left to right in unison.
Trackways of meat-eating theropods are less common, but one occurrence is Bird's specimen from Glen Rose, Texas, a part of which is on display at AMNH. In all, the Paluxy River trackways, some of which were sent to other institutions, reveal the footprints of at least 12 sauropods and at least three, large, carnivorous dinosaurs moving along a mudflat above the waterline. But it is unclear how long after the sauropods passed that the theropods followed or if they moved in a pack. However, in Bolivia, paleontologist Giusseppe Leonardi discovered eight parallel trackways of six adult and two juvenile sauropods moving along the shore in a front, followed shortly afterward by a pack of at least 32 medium sized, carnivorous theropods, moving in the same general direction along the same front.
Want to join the conversation?
- How many types of dinosaurs are there ?(2 votes)
- Those dinosaur foot prints are so big!
How exactly do you preserve them, without damaging the shape?(1 vote)- The prints are in rock, so don't necessarily need preserving. In the photo, they have been taken out of the surrounding rock in a big slab - once out of the weather, they will last well by themselves.(2 votes)
- are here real dinosaur fossils in national museum natural history in India?(1 vote)
- Please be direct with me.(1 vote)
- How Doesn't Mud not just fill in the tracks and conceal it forever? and also why did some sauropods have no teeth but swallow rocks?(1 vote)
- It would deped on how wet the mud is. Some sauropods had to swallow rocks to digest their tough, plant would that they ate.(1 vote)
- how did archeologist found foot prints of dinosaurs if the foot prints were blown away by wind or by any land erosion ?(1 vote)
- Does anyone happen to know much about Troodon social behavior? I've heard that they probably made good parents (as far as Dinosaurs went) but that's about all I really know.
Thanks.(1 vote) - Is it ? that grouped hunters need indicate a herd possibility they are following the herd food source independently?(1 vote)
- Could you rephrase that, please? I don't know what you're trying to say.(1 vote)
- Did the Carcharodontosaurus hunt in herds and packs or alone?(1 vote)