Fossil record of prehistoric animal conflicts

[Supercommunist]

Post fossil evidence and accounts of extinct animals getting into physical altercations.

Stegosaurus vs allosaurus

www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/10/141021114903.htm

T.rex vs T.rex

www.livescience.com/7924-bite-marks-show-rex-teens-fought-viciously.html

listen.sdpb.org/post/violent-life-murray-t-rex

[theropod]

Probably the most famous:
the Velociraptor vs Protoceratops fighting pair→

The same paper also describes a 7m long Edmontosaurus with injured mid-caudal neural spines, probably due to a T. rex bite. The same individual had a pathology on its ilium which may have made it easier prey, however the victim escaped as is shown by signs of bone regrowth and infection.

Similar cases here: www.academia.edu/782413/Possible_theropod_predation_evidence_in_hadrosaurid_dinosaurs_from_the_Upper_Maastrichtian_Upper_Cretaceous_of_Aren_Huesca_Spain_
And here: www.pnas.org/content/110/31/12560.abstract
This suggests the proximal to middle parts of the tail were a common target region in (Tyrannosaurid) Theropod attacks on hadrosaurs, but also that those went wrong frequently (probably because the bite failed to incapacitate the locomotive system due to catching the wrong part of the vertebrae).

This is also relevant: www.yale.edu/ypmip/predation/Chapter_09.pdf

[creature386]

ABSTRACT: Cranial material of Sinraptor dongi (Upper Jurassic, Xinjiang, China), Gorgosau- rus libratus, Daspletosaurus torosus (Upper Cretaceous, Alberta, Canada), and other large theropod dinosaurs exhibit similar paleopathological anomalies indicative of aggressive in- tra- or interspecific biting. Tooth strike trauma includes osseous lesions caused by solitary or multiple tooth punctures, or by dragging or gouging the tooth tips across the surfaces of cranial elements. Many of these lesions were undergoing active healing at the time of death. One isolated tyrannosaurid dentary bears a broken off and embedded tooth tip of another ty- rannosaur. Comparison with unhealed large theropod toothmarks on prey bone suggests that sublethal wounds ofthese types were caused by other large theropods, possibly rival conspecifics. This may indicate aggressive head or face-biting behavior in certain theropod families. Other associated traumatic osteopathy typified as localized rib and fibula fractures were observed but cannot be directly correlated with violent intra- or interspecific behavior. Healed and healing bite wounds ofthe head may be related to a numberoffactors. Establish- ment of dominance within a pack and territorial behavior are considered as two of the most likely causes. Study of paleopathologies is demonstrated to be a useful tool for understand- ing dinosaur behavior.

www.arca.museus.ul.pt/ArcaSite/obj/gaia/MNHNL-0000781-MG-DOC-web.PDF

[Infinity Blade]

theworldofanimals.proboards.com/thread/923/evidence-allosaurus-stegosaurus-confrontation
theworldofanimals.proboards.com/thread/907/evidence-phytosaur-rauisuchian-confrontation

[full]

"If the cat sank those fangs into a vigorously struggling animal, there was a good chance that they would snap. In fact a recent discovery suggests this is what happened to the Smilodon who left parts of his shattered teeth in the skeleton of a dire wolf."


link


Dr Diedrich has researched the remains of 13 cave lions found in Zoolithen.



In the journal Historical Biology he describes how none were cubs, suggesting that cave lions, like their modern African relatives, didn't also raise their young inside the rocky caverns.



Crucially the lions were mostly older males, reinforcing the impression that only the bigger males entered the caves, supporting the idea they did so to hunt bears.



Or it could be that whole prides entered, with the adult males doing most of the fighting.



The cave lions may have targeted the bears after their usual prey, mammoth and woolly rhinoceros, disappeared.



Hunters become victims



Backing this idea are two cave bear skulls found within Zoolithen cave, which have been marked by lion's teeth.



Sketch of a cave lion skeleton (Image: Wilhelm Bölsche)

Sketch of a cave lion skeleton

Also found are the skeletons of giant hyenas, which also frequented similar Pleistocene caves.



They suggest that lions and hyenas also did battle, with some of these lion remains being dragged into the caves by giant hyenas, packs of which either killed the lions of scavenged their carcasses.



And hyenas may have scavenged cave bear bodies.



"Lions and hyenas ate the intestines and inner organs first," says Dr Diedrich.



But they also strongly suggest that some cave lions lost the fight with cave bears.



Being herbivorous, the cave bears wouldn't have scavenged the bodies of any lions they killed.



Instead they would have just trampled them into the cave floor, leaving the evidence we see today of these titanic struggles.


link

[Infinity Blade]

On the Hyaenodon profile, I've posted information regarding interactions with Dinictis.

[Infinity Blade]

The holotype specimen of Archaeornithoides (a juvenile) shows evidence of its jaws being bitten off by a weasel-sized predatory mammal, namely a deltatheridiid (namely Deltatheridium itself).

earth.geology.yale.edu/~ajs/1993/11.1993.08Elzanowski.pdf

If the event was a predation event (the fact that the head was bitten may potentially be an indication of this), then this incident fits here. Consider too that this specimen of Archaeornithoides was estimated to have a total body length of ~50-60 cm. Deltatheridium, on the other hand, is claimed by Internet-goers to be at ~15 cm long (anyone can feel free to confirm or refute this), making it much smaller than the dinosaur...


link to original image

[theropod]

One of the the most impressive cases of predation in the fossil record:

liston 2006 said:

Two specimens, however, suggest
stronger evidence for attack rather than accidental breakage of elements. These feature a
series of elements with marks that give an arc unlike one of impact, but strongly
resembling the curve of a bite. The first specimen (BMNH P.6924) was excavated by
Alfred Leeds and accessioned by the BM(NH) in 1893 (Liston & Noe 20(4), and consists
of a series of dorsal fin-rays (fig. 9.3A-C). Although, as was Alfred Leeds' usual practice.
they have been washed clean of their clay and so do not have any matrix to indicate their
precise relations when found, a comparable specimen excavated by Henry Keeping
(CAMSM J.46873, fig. 2.3, fig. 4.10) has preserved some matrix that indicates that these
elements were in contact at their broad bases. With this knowledge, the arrangement of the
bones in life can be reconstructed, providing an estimated width of bite of 130mm, with
signs of a tooth impression of 47mm diameter. As far as is known, a bite and tooth this
size in the Oxford Clay sea could only have been made by a pliosaur, the plesiosaurs
having too small a gape (Andrews 1910). A pliosaur tooth of this girth (probably
Liopleurodon) would have a crown of around IOOmm length, with a total length of around
300mm (L. Noe, pers. comm., 51712006). The second specimen to give evidence of the
specific mouth shape of an attacker is BMNH P.62054, a collection of fin-rays (probably
pectoral, but this can only be confirmed or denied once the preparation of the pectoral fins
of PETMG F.174 has been completed) donated by I. Crowson (via D.M. Martill) in July
1985 from the Bunting's Lane borrow pit near Peterborough, believed to be from Bed 12
(Hudson & Martill 1994). A section of this was figured by Martill (I 986b: plate 9C), but
viewing the entire specimen (fig. 9.3d) indicates the constrained arc of the damage, again
suggesting a mouth. Smaller in size, it could be from a plesiosaur as well as a small
pliosaur (Andrews 1913), but it is too broad and curved to have been made by a
crocodilian.

Liston suggests that most Leedsichthys specimens are in the 8–12 m range, body mass estimates based on his model would suggests this corresponds to 5–18 t specimens.

Liston, J.J. 2006. A fish fit for Ozymandias? : the ecology, growth and osteology of Leedsichthys (Pachycormidae, Actinopterygii). PhD Thesis, University of Glasgow, 464pp. theses.gla.ac.uk/6473/1/2006listonphd.pdf

[Infinity Blade]

As I have posted in another thread->, there is another ceratopsid specimen (and a pretty sizable one at that, having a ~2m skull despite not being fully grown) that shows evidence of active predation by a tyrannosaurid. One bite trace showed signs of healing, indicating it had survived one altercation, but there were multiple other bite traces that showed no signs of healing. Because the skull was not extensively bitten or gnawed upon, there is no sign of scavenging on the ceratopsian skull. My guess is that the ceratopsid survived one encounter but was killed in another or something like that.

There is also a specimen of Australopithecus sp. (A. prometheus, as it was dubbed), that was found in a pit with an extinct baboon species called Parapapio broomi. It's been suggested that the two fell into their deaths together while fighting each other. I'd post a link to the full article on Sci-Hub, but right now it's not showing up for some reason (or at least, it sure is taking its time to load). So here's a preview of the article->, which doesn't include the bit about the baboon (although, if you click 'show all figures' you'll see one with baboon remains, so I'm not lying about it).

Lastly, some evidence of probable predation and butchery of 90 Theropithecus oswaldi individuals by Homo erectus at one site.

Primate fossils from the Acheulian handaxe site at Olorgesailie, Kenya, are analyzed in an attempt to evaluate Isaac's suggestion that Locality DE/89 B preserves the remains of the hunting and butchering of giant gelada baboons. The age and sex structure of the 90 individuals suggests that attritional mortality occurred. This evidence is consistent with predation on small numbers of individuals at a time by either hominids or carnivores. A comparative method of analyzing breakage patterns is used. The type and frequency of breaks on each skeletal element are compared statistically with those on the same skeletal elements of primates from broadly contemporaneous sites where hunting and butchering are not suggested to have occured but where carnivore activity and other sources of damage have occurred. Some aspects of the breakage pattern on the Olorgesailie baboon material are significantly different from those at the nonhominid sites. The breaks in question could have occurred during disarticulation of the primates. The most probable interpretation of the evidence is that the hominids at Olorgesailie systematically and repeatedly hunted and butchered giant geladas. This is the first evidence of such a behavior in the fossil record.

www.researchgate.net/publication/249178249_Butchering_of_Giant_Geladas_at_an_Acheulian_Site

[Amaltheus]

It may be another "product placement" but last spring we described a new species of the metriorhynchid Cricosaurus. Interestingly, the holotype is overall articulated but the posterior half of its tail was separated from the body and found several meters away. It looks like being literalily cut off. We can't think of any taphonomic process that could produce such a preservation, hence we agree with the folks, who found the fossil that it was likely bitten off by a larger animal. A possible predator could be Dakosaurus, which was evidently present in the same lagoonal environment our Cricosaurus bambergensis was found.

www.app.pan.pl/archive/published/app64/app005412018.pdf

[Ceratodromeus]

Look just to the right of the center of this skull to see where another mosasaur left a tooth in the jaw of this mosasaur. (Image credit: Courtesy of the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology)


www.livescience.com/56666-mosasaur-tooth-stuck-in-sea-monster-face.html

[Infinity Blade]

I'm going to see if I can find the original source for this, but I'd have no problem if someone beat me to it. For the juvenile tyrannosaurid to not have destroyed the jaw of a 10 kg theropod (as an adult or even a much larger subadult would), I imagine it must have been quite small, thus attesting to the superprecociality of these animals.

Aase Roland Jacobsen published a description of a Saurornitholestes dentary in 2001. The dentary is about 12 cm long and preserves fifteen tooth positions, of which only ten preserve teeth. Three toothmarks were visible on the inner "lingual" surface of the dentary. Two of the three marks are series of grooves made by the serrations on the maker's teeth. The striations are between .37 mm and .40 mm thick with cuboidal cross-sections.

The shape of the preserved serrations are too different from those of Saurornitholestes for the marks to be the result of injuries incurred during intraspecific face biting behaviors. Although the right shape for Dromaeosaurus tooth serrations, the preserved marks are too coarse to have been left by that genus. Although a specific identification cannot be made, the most likely perpetrator would be a juvenile individual of one of the Dinosaur Park Formation's tyrannosaurids, like Gorgosaurus, or Daspletosaurus.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saurornitholestes#Bite_marks_from_tyrannosaur

[Infinity Blade]

This is an interesting one. Sinraptor hepingensis with a healed scapular wound likely caused by a Mamenchisaurus tail strike.

A scapula with healed wound of Yangchuanosaurus (Sinraptor) hepingensis ZDM 0024 from Zigong Dinosaur Museum of China is described. This is the first detailed description on pathology of theropoda in China. The discontinuous cortical bones, angular deformity and bony callus suggest an external force-caused wound healing in this bone, rather than a pathological fracture. Mamenchisaurus hochuanensis with tail club among the contemporary fauna is probably the candidate for the assault. This presents an attractive explanation to the bone fracture of Yangchuanosaurus hepingensis.

www.researchgate.net/publication/287915185_A_scapular_fracture_in_Yangchuanosaurus_hepingensis_Di-nosauria_Theropoda

[Supercommunist]

Not an actual fossil record but I don't know where else to put this:

[Infinity Blade]

A cervical rib from an indeterminate tetanuran (non-maniraptoriform) from the Eric the Red West site in Cape Otway, Victoria. It has depressions interpreted as bite marks made by a small theropod. The lack of healing suggests the bite was inflicted around the time of death (Poropat et al., 2019).

The two anterior depressions on the anterolateral process of NMV P252700 are herein interpreted as bite marks (Fig. 2C, D). Based on their arrangement and dimensions, it is plausible that the bite was inflicted by a small theropod. Their spacing suggests that the aggressor bit below the neck and in the direction of the head. The absence of any healing traces suggests that this bite was inflicted perimortem.