It is rare to find fossils showing animals interacting. Another fossil found in the 1970s in Mongolia shows two dinosaurs - predator Velociraptor and plant-eater Protoceratops - fighting about 80 million years ago before being buried alive, perhaps in a collapsing sand dune.
The researchers discounted the idea that the Repenomamus and Psittacosaurus fossil showed a mammal merely scavenging a carcass.
"For one, the mammal is on top of the dinosaur as though it was trying to subdue it, which the scavenging hypothesis doesn't account for," Mallon said.
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"Second, there are no bite marks on the bones of the dinosaur, which we would expect if it had been sitting out for long, exposed to scavengers. Lastly, the hind foot of the mammal is trapped by the folded hind leg of the dinosaur, which is unlikely to have happened if the dinosaur had already been dead when the mammal came across it," Mallon added.
While Psittacosaurus was an early relative of the horned dinosaur lineage, it lacked facial horns and a head crest. It possessed a parrot-like beak to crop plant material.
Repenomamus, one of the dinosaur age's largest mammals, had short and sprawling limbs, a long tail, a sinuous body, a robust skull and shearing teeth. Mallon compared its appearance to the living Chinese ferret-badger.
https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMidWh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LnRoZXdlYXRoZXJuZXR3b3JrLmNvbS9lbi9uZXdzL25hdHVyZS9hbmltYWxzL2RyYW1hdGljLWZvc3NpbC1zaG93cy1wdWduYWNpb3VzLW1hbW1hbC1hdHRhY2tpbmctYS1kaW5vc2F1ctIBAA?oc=5
2023-07-18 23:22:00Z
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