I feel the exact same way. No way can they no all of the crap the claim to, but it still makes for an interesting watch. I too like Dinosaur George's coreographed fights and the end.
One thing I thought was really interesting on the show, if true, is that Raptors didn't need to exhale. They just inhaled and little holes in their bones would do the exhaling through their skin for them!
No wonder they could have been so fast!
Yea, one of the many "facts" that was exaggerated on the show. We have no evidence for cutaneous respiration in raptors, whether extant or extinct. The evolution of hollow bones, it's believed, was originally for added speed and agility in the raptor niche for hunting prey; most people think this is why the feature is seen retained in modern birds, having been of adaptive advantage to achieving flight, making them lighter in weight. The whole "these animals didn't have to exhale" is not just a stretch, but doesn't follow phylogenetically; in fact, we can test for it in a laboratory setting. Try it with a pigeon or other domestic bird. I'm sure there's a way to rig an experiment. If you only allow the animal to inhale, it's not going to go over well for the health of the bird. The bird lung is compartmentalized to ensure that there is always fresh air in the lung, allowing for maximum respiratory efficiency. Unless it's an amphibian or less derived vertebrate, the bird's out of luck. They made a similar claim with the Megalodon, saying that it could "literally taste the ocean through its skin," which is just a blatant falsehood. The denticles, "teeth-like" protrusions, on the skin of a shark, are to help make it stream-lined in swimming, not to help it taste-test the ocean. Just because the word "tooth" is thrown in, they start to interpret that as taste...
Sorry, I love the show, but some of their assertions are just mind-boggling. The Allosaurus/Ceratosaurus episode was great. The way they described the Allosaurus eventually rendering the Ceratosaurus extinct due to it being a generalized predator that outcompeted the Ceratosaurus, was very well done.
There's an interesting thought... A dio with THREE dinos: an Allosaurus, Ceratosaurus, and, say, a Stegosaurus. I would love to see these carnivores fighting over who gets to take on the Stego - which is quite capable of fending off either of them. Another cool dio would be Allosaurs and Ceratosaurs scavenging and fighting over a Diplodocus corpse. That would seem to be a winner for sure.
This is ridiculously cool.
Theres an old movie with a triceratops/tyrannosaurus fight and it was the first thing that came to mind when I saw this. The tri loses, but he gores the t-rex first.
Was it a claymation fight? I think it was an old documentary-type school special. It was particularly graphic and brutal, as I recall. Damn good.
but that's what I wanted to say. It's clearly that the T-Rex is not extending the body.
