Can Spinosaurus aegyptiacus run?

[Deleted]

Can the most massive theropod known run?


I haven't scaled Scott Hartman's 2013 Spinosaurus to the size of MSNM V4047 yet, but I have a hunch that it would yield a probable mass in the range of ~12-15 tonnes. That would be similar to Diplodocus longus and large Paraceratherium in size. It's a biped to boot.


Can it run with all that?



If you can explain your reasons,please do so.

[creature386]

As it is close to the maximum mass of a biped, I would say no. It likely wasn't even a fully terrestrial animal.

[gigadino96]

Probably not running, it seems that an animal of +10 tons too heavy. But perhaps he could walk quickly.

[theropod]

We can only speculate on the maximum mass, but I agree it is likely close to it. I think its massive spinous processes made of solid bone are probably an adaption for supporting its massive body with a greater amount of muscles.

I think we cannot say much about whether it could run. We would have to find its legs to judge about its capabilities. I would not exclude it totally, but I personally envision it could at best walk quickly, like an elephant, given its mass. I don´t think bipedality is such a big problem for its speed, rather a problem for the maximum mass it can support and keep stable.
With enough muscle mass, which can be inferred, it could undoubtedly move fast, tough whether it could run is a different question.

The question is whether it has metatarsals that fulfill a spring-like propulsive function, or whether its legs are just graviportal. Inferring that from smaller relatives is of limited use, but at least even the biggest of theropods in which we know them (T. rex, Giganotosaurus) don’t have graviportal legs. So no idea how fast it was or whether it could run, but everything is posible as of now.

[Fragillimus335]

It depends on what you classify as a "run". If you mean suspending both limbs in the air during locomotion, I doubt it. But I bet Spinosaurus was capable of decent bouts of speed, perhaps 15mph.

[dinosauria101]

I don't know about running, but it could probably stagger about like a crocodile.

[theropod]

"Stagger about"?

[dinosauria101]

Well I can't think of much else it'd do!

[theropod]

So leaving aside that now, 5 years after the publication, there’s still no osteological description of the specimen this is based on, and there are still published doubts standing as to whether it isn’t a chimaera, how exactly does that remind you of a crocodile?

For starters, all extant crocodiles are quadrupedal. Secondly, crocodiles don’t "stagger about" either, they have several distinct gaits, including, for the smaller ones, gallopping. And thirdly, Spinosaurus, even if it had short legs, still has a parasagittal, erect leg posture, which characterizes all dinosaurs.

[dinosauria101]

Oops.
Well, I don't see it running.

[rock]

i do not think so they seam too heavy to run fast or at all , also they were likley like todays crocodiles and waited in the water for a meal to come by [for instance a smaller dinosaur , fish or a small shark].

[creature386]

It's unlikely that they were that aquatic, see Henderson's recent paper on how Spinosaurus was likely a bad diver:
doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5409

[dinosauria101]

^I agree. Spino was most likely crocodile-like, not shark-like. Otherwise legs would be useless

[Infinity Blade]

May 1, 2019 20:17:40 GMT 5 theropod said:

So leaving aside that now, 5 years after the publication, there’s still no osteological description of the specimen this is based on, and there are still published doubts standing as to whether it isn’t a chimaera, how exactly does that remind you of a crocodile?

For starters, all extant crocodiles are quadrupedal. Secondly, crocodiles don’t "stagger about" either, they have several distinct gaits, including, for the smaller ones, gallopping. And thirdly, Spinosaurus, even if it had short legs, still has a parasagittal, erect leg posture, which characterizes all dinosaurs.

There's still some legitimate doubt about the proportions of Spinosaurus as per Ibrahim et al. (2014)? I was under the impression we had that all laid down, but huh.

Does the supplementary material of the aforementioned publication not count as an osteological description?

[theropod]

No it does not, most of the material isn’t properly figured or described in any sort of anatomical detail. It’s better in that regard than some so-called "descriptions" of other theropods, but it’s still not a proper description. Back then I was under the impression that the authors were planning to follow up their note in science with a monograph describing the new material in detail, but if they really were, they are taking their sweet time with it.

Evers et al. (2015) disagrees with pretty much the entire taxonomy in Ibrahim et al. (2014), considering Spinosaurus maroccanus a junior synonym of a valid Sigilmassasaurus bervicollis (which would make MSNM v4047 more likely referrable to Sigilmassasaurus than to Spinosaurus, since it’s not really distinguishable from other maroccanus material). They also express severe doubts about the "neotype" material actually coming from the same specimen because it was acquired from fossil collectors in two separate sets, and then later "completed" with material the authors excavated at the supposed discovery site shown to them by the collector, and the argument from "Spinosaurus B" also doesn’t seem to hold much water, since it isn’t clearly from a single individual either and it is anatomically quite different.

In other words, the sensational new proportions of Spinosaurus, as popular as they have become in paleoart, haven’t actually been substantiated scientifically. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence