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The biggest dinosaurs that lived on Earth
The biggest dinosaurs that lived on Earth
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The biggest dinosaurs that lived on Earth
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I made this thread to get information about big dinosaurs that walked on earth. So Lets discuss and debate about them.
Just like modern animal, biggest dinosaurs belong to herbivorous group. In our world Animal like Elephant, Giraffe, Rhino, Hippo are the biggest, heaviest and longest animal and all are herbivorous. Biggest dinosaurs are sauropods. By far the largest creatures ever to roam the earth, sauropods branched into numerous genera and species over the course of 100 million years, and their remains have been dug up on every continent. From my sources, The biggest verified dinosaurs is Argentinosaurus. The size of Argentinosaurus has been supported by convincing evidence. In 1986 the remains of this gigantic titanosaur was discovered in Argentina (and hence the name). According to paleontologists Argentinosaurus could have weight 100 tons and over 120 feet long from head to tail. Other contender are Amphicoelias fragilis, Bruthathkayosaurus, Futalognkosaurus and Brachiosaurus. Amphicoelias fragilis said to be longest and may be heaviest dinosaurs of all time, Source claim that it was 200 feet long and almost 125 tons heavy. This dinosaur is represented in the fossil record by a single vertebra measuring 5 by 9 feet long, truly enormous proportions that correspond to a sauropod measuring about 200 feet from head to tail and weighing over 125 tons. But Not everyone is convinced, especially since we no longer have that backbone to examine. So I don't think it should be considered as biggest dinosaurs Bruthathkayosaurus found in woodland of India is said to weight about 200 tons and 150 feet long. But once again not enough evidence to support it. Pieces of Bruthathkayosaurus that have been identified so far don't convincingly support to a titanosaur Futalognkosaurus is also of huge size nearly 100 feet long and 75 tons heavy. Good thing about this dinosaurs is that about 70 percent of skeleton has been recovered which is more than any titanosaur. There are many more contender in this category and I am sure many of other will emerge in future. Next we will discuss about Giant theropods (Meat eating). Like Spinosaurus, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Giganotosaurus 
Spinosaurus
 *This image is copyright of its original author The spinosaurus is the biggest carnivorous dinosaur to ever live. It lived in what is now know as North-Africa, in the early stages of the Cenomanian stages of the Cretaceous Period. Most of you guys on this forum that knows a bit about dinosaurs knows that the first speciment of spinosaurus was found by Ernst Stromer in 1915 in Egypt. He found a lower jaw, teeth, several pieces of its erected spine, ribs, vertebrae and a single phalanx. But what Stromer found was all destroyed during WW2, when the museum it was in was bombed, and all evidence, and the only evidence of Spinos was destroyed. Stromer estimated the Spinosaurus to be around 12 meters long. But newer discoveries from 1999, 2005 and 2014 suggest evidence that may have reached lengths of 18 meters. Dr. Dal Sasso even suggested that Spino reached lengths of 20 meters, which would be an astonishing lentgh. The biggest individual ever was also found be Dr. Dal Sasso. He found a mere complete upperjaw that had a length of 2 meters!  *This image is copyright of its original author Here is a plaque that shows the two first, and the two biggest individuals ever found of both T-Rex and Spinos. And what scientists belive is their weight. Regarding their wheight it`s really hard to say really how big they were. Some scientists suggest 7 tonnes, some suggest 22 tonnes. But my estimations is that the Largest individuals ranged from 8-12,5 tonnes. Size has been really hard to tell in the past 10 years because of lack of evidence on the dinosaur alone. But now I see a clearer image of the spinos size, and how it lived. Before the newest discovery in 2014 we thought that Spinos lived like most other carnivorous dinosaurs, but the new evidence acctually shows that they lived a large portion of their lives in water. And is one of very few semi-aquatic dinosaurs. Evidence also shows that it was a notorius fisheater, the last land living piscivoreous dinosaur to ever live. Its thought that they manily preyed upon sawfish, which looks exactly the same as the modern sawfish, but it grew to 8 meters in length. They have found several of the sawspines of sawfish inbeded in the teeth spinos. Like crocodilians they have small pits in their snouts, these pits are connected to very sensitiv nerves that are connected to the brain, and that gives spinos a great advantage when fishing. These pits can sense any movement in the water, so spinos don`t even have to see the fish to kill it. Its also thought that spinos, in the tougher periods of the year, when water and fish was scares, could prey on flying dinosaurs, because they have found several evidence of this in the spinos closest cousins in South-America and Asia, where they have found teeth of spinos inprintet in the bones of flying dinosaurs. They are also thought to prey on Ouranosaurus, but this is a less likely prey, since Spinos most likely was slow, and also walked on four legs most of the time. They really didn`t seem to be comfortable out of water. Its even thougth that they might have webbed feet.  *This image is copyright of its original author It lived with a lot of other big carnivourus Dinosaurs, like Carcharodontosaurus and Rugops, and also giant Crocodiles. Its even belived that rugops, a giant dinosaur measuring 7-9 meters, even scavanged on the scraps of the successful Spino. It has been suggested that Spinos and Carcharodontosaurus were rivals, and they even have evidence of a battle between these two carnivores, where there have been found the tooth of a Carcharodontosaurus inbeded in the elongated spine of the Spino. And as far a the crocodiles go, the Spino obviously lived in water, so I don`t think Crocodiles posed as any kind of threat, or danger towards spinos.  *This image is copyright of its original author Spino vs Giant Croc art  *This image is copyright of its original author Spino and a rugops in the background  *This image is copyright of its original author Spino and a Carcharodontosaurus fight over a Ouranosaurus
@Jubatus I have already made a thread for biggest dinosaurs, This post should be under that. No need to make a thread only for Spinosaurs.
Request to Mod please move this post to http://wildfact.com/forum/topic-the-bigg...d-on-earth 
In fact, that images of the T.rex and the Spinosaurus are old and inaccurate. This is the last image for comparison, approved by Paleontologist that had actually worked with Spinosaurus:
 *This image is copyright of its original author In order: Spinosarus, Giganotosaurus, Tyrannosuarus and Suchomimus. As we can see, Spinosaurus was long, over 3 meters longer than T.rex, but it was very low and rarely walked in two legs. It measured c.15 meters long and weighed c.9 tons (estimations of up to 20 tons are unreliable and most be discarded). T.rex measured c.13 meters long, but it was higher at the hips (c.4 meters) and weighed the same (c.9 tons too). Giganotosaurus was of the same size than T.rex, or probably 1 meter longer, using the largest specimen, but weighed comparative less, between 7 to 8 tons. 
Spinosaurus may have been heavier than its frame suggested, as per Ibrahim et al. (2014), "Bone density within the long bones, in addition, is 30 to 40% greater in Spinosaurus than in other theropods (8)". The bone density issue is the reason why tigers are oddly heavy for their bone frame.
See attachment for the Therian study. I can't say anything on the potential accuracy of any estimate yet.
From my sources -
1. Spinosarus is the world's largest carnivorous dinosaur, though further evidence is under search to make it 100% acceptable. Full grown spinosarus was about 10 ton, 1 ton more than T Rex and half ton more than Giganotosaurus . In end of 2014 researchers said Spinosaurus had a semiaquatic lifestyle, and may have spent more time in the rivers of its northern African habitat than on dry land  *This image is copyright of its original author Spinosaurs Skeleton  *This image is copyright of its original author A still from movie Jurassic park - T rex vs Spinosaurs 2. Giganotosaurus is somewhere in between Spinosarus and T rex but they live 95 Million year ago, i.e. 30 million year before the T. rex. Sources says they were little less than 10 tons  *This image is copyright of its original author Giganotosaurus Skeleton  *This image is copyright of its original author 3. Tyrannosaurus Rex, Most famous due to press and hollywood movie. Nearly 40 feet long and 9 tons heavy T rex is one of most dangerous predator of his time T rex forearms were very very tiny when compared to other Theropods of his size. Female where little bigger than male. These were hunter and scavenger  *This image is copyright of its original author
(06-15-2015, 09:19 AM)'tigerluver' Wrote: Spinosaurus may have been heavier than its frame suggested, as per Ibrahim et al. (2014), "Bone density within the long bones, in addition, is 30 to 40% greater in Spinosaurus than in other theropods (8)". The bone density issue is the reason why tigers are oddly heavy for their bone frame.Actually the study of Therrien is invalid, as they used carnosaurs to get the weight of Spinosaurus, they presented a short but fat Spinosaurus which has nothing of the real Spinosaurus presented by Ibrahim and Sereno. I think that Spinosarus is the contrary of tigers, they have dense bones but a light frame and body. I think that to compare T.rex and Spinosarus is like to compare an Albatros and an Harpy eagle, if you know what I mean. [img]images/smilies/wink.gif[/img]  (06-15-2015, 10:26 AM)'GuateGojira' Wrote:(06-15-2015, 09:19 AM)'tigerluver' Wrote: Spinosaurus may have been heavier than its frame suggested, as per Ibrahim et al. (2014), "Bone density within the long bones, in addition, is 30 to 40% greater in Spinosaurus than in other theropods (8)". The bone density issue is the reason why tigers are oddly heavy for their bone frame.Actually the study of Therrien is invalid, as they used carnosaurs to get the weight of Spinosaurus, they presented a short but fat Spinosaurus which has nothing of the real Spinosaurus presented by Ibrahim and Sereno. I think that Spinosarus is the contrary of tigers, they have dense bones but a light frame and body. From childhood forward, T-Rex was my favorite. It's unknown what science will reveal in the future. That remains a tanatalizing mystery. I believe we've barely scratched the surface in that capacity. What treasures will be unearthed? Can't wait to find out.
I spoke to Nazir Ibrahim today, and he also said that he estimated the spino to be around the same weight as the Tyrannosaurus Rex (7-9 tons), but he said that there is no doubt that they could grow bigger. But still the Spinosaurus got a few meters on the T-Rex. But Dr.Dal Sasso who found what seems to be the biggest Spinosaurus skeleton ever said that he thought spinos could reach towards 20 meters. But you`ll never know until you got enough evidence to really pinpoint the real size. That goes for both T-Rex and Spinos. But Spinos did had a lot of big competitors, both Carharodontosaurus (7-7.5 tons) and The giant crocs (Up towards 8 tons), so the Spino had to be big to be the dominant predator. It probably constantly had to compete with crocs in the water, and it had it compete with Carcharodontosaurus on land. There are even evidence of a fight with a large Carnivore, likely Carcharodontosaurus. So this competition gives the spino a lot of potential to grow to great sizes
If we made the analogy between the giant theropods and the big cats, then it should be:
Spinosaurus - Smilodon Tyrannosaurus - Tiger Giganotosaurus - American Lion Carcharodontosaurus - Cave Lion Allosaurus - African Lion 
Jubatus' last post was deleted.
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Remember also that T-rex was a coelurosaur, a distant relative of the smaller raptors, intelligent ( for a dino ), with powerful jaws and stereoscopic vision. Probably primarily a scavenger but also a hunter, like the spotted hyena. I believe that T-rex had enough going for him to be a tough opponant for any of the other dino predators, had they lived in the same location during the same time period. Of course, I'm a wee bit biased for the dinosaur that was the unchallenged king during my growing up years.
Call me biased if you like, but I think that the best analogy for T. rex is the Bengal tiger. Why? well, check they ecology: In the last part of the Cretaceous of north America, the T. rex was the largest and more powerful predator, unchallenged by anyone, and the largest competitor was Nanotyrannus, IF you think that it was another species. If not, the next largest predator were the Dromaeosaurus! In this context they look like India, where the second largest predator is the leopard and they are nothing for a mighty tiger, also the dholes are pack hunters like Dromaeosaurus, although the difference in weight is ridiculous in this case (tiger 260 kg - dhole 15 kg; Tyrannosaurus 8 ton - Dromaeosaurus 30 kg [img]images/smilies/exclamation.gif[/img]).
Like in India, larger prey were scarse, with only a few Alamosaurus (gaur-buffalo) over the area, but most prey were smaller than T.rex, with the exception of Ankilosaurus (wild boar) and the mighty Triceratops (Sambar) which were about the same weight. All the evidence suggest that T. rex was a perfect predator, with a huge brain, large eyes with perfect stereoscopic vision, a great olfactory sense and the most powerful jaws in the land animals. Yes, the arms were short, but if we compare other giant carnivores, ALL have smaller arms, even those of Giganotosaurus are ridiculously small too. For me, T.rex is perfectly developed predator, created to kill by ambush and direct contact.
@Jubatus, Dr Dal Sasso never said that Spinosaurus weighed 20 tons, he states a weight of up to 7-9 tons, which is in line with Dr Ibrahim, check this out:
 *This image is copyright of its original author The exagerated and ridiculous weight of 20 tons came from Therrien and Henderson, and that weight is already discualified as they used Carnosaurs which are shorter and more robust than the Spinosaurus family members. I think that c.15 metes and c.8 tons is the maximum for a Spinosaurus, based in the presente evidence, but of course, record-larger animals could happen. The same goes to all the other carnivores.
Has anyone used the Spinosaurus specimen in Ibrahim et al. (2014) to reconstruct the famous skull's body?
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