Interesting that there's a big jump in size the last eight (from Giraffatitan?) are almost double the size of the previous group. Is that just gap in the record?

Also; some artistic license with the colouring.

Do we actually know what colour they were?

Scot Dutchy wrote:Do we actually know what colour they were?

No.

I was curious about the color too. What about the feathers, how many do we have evidence for? I remember it wasn't all that long ago they found the first evidence for feathers, is that right? And the locomotion, how well can they pin that down? It would be cool to have video with a comparison of running and walking gaits and speeds. Very cool video.

How did they survive with such long necks? Blood pressure must be enormous.

Locomotion is pretty easy - measuring bone structure, comparing it to found footprints, gives a good ballpark for walking speed.

Feathers are being found more in fossils.

Color - still a crap shoot.

Weaver wrote:It's an efficient way to get at high-height vegetation while minimizing overall body mass.

Also efficient for sweeping a wide area with minimal energy expenditure. They function very much like a crane delivering their mouth to any position in a wide arc of the tree canopy without ever having to move their body.

Scot Dutchy wrote:How did they survive with such long necks? Blood pressure must be enormous.

Valves in the arteries, plus muscular activity in the neck. A herby of that size would need a lot of grub.

Weaver wrote:No, doesn't imply that - only that there were other animals taking up the niche of lower vegetation, and the ability to hit the heights enabled them to exploit an unused niche.

From the articulation that I have seen of all of those long-neck guys, they din't HAVE the ability to reach higher heights at all.

Notice that all of them have their long necks stretched out in front of them?

I know that plenty of ancient and modern characteristics actually have no significance at all, when it comes to "fitness for survival." Kind of like the old saying "sometimes a cigar is just a cigar," sometimes the reason a lot of critters have a given characteristic isn't due to evolutionary pressures, but the reverse: when an entirely unrelated factor happened to wipe out most of their ancestors, the remaining ones survived because of factor X... and entirely by coincidence, also possessed factor Z, which was passed down to everyone else, simply because it was there, and DIDN'T cause their parents to die before procreating.

So it's probably the same reason why Tyrannosaurus Rex had those wimpy arms: because they did, and it didn't lead to them all dying before they made babies.

Maybe what the real story is, is that the reason for so many long-necks, is because dinosaurs are a really limited bunch of critters, with an extremely narrow successful genetic code. Could also be why they died out so fast.

igorfrankensteen wrote:Notice that all of them have their long necks stretched out in front of them?

Did you watch a different video to the rest of us, because that isn't what the video Cali linked to shows.

igorfrankensteen wrote:

So it's probably the same reason why Tyrannosaurus Rex had those wimpy arms: because they did, and it didn't lead to them all dying before they made babies.

Maybe what the real story is, is that the reason for so many long-necks, is because dinosaurs are a really limited bunch of critters, with an extremely narrow successful genetic code. Could also be why they died out so fast.

I thought the little arms were key to T-rex success, wouldn't use up so much time masturbating.

Was the Puertasaurus really blue with white spots? Either way, nice work and great video. Thanks!