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Course: American Museum of Natural History > Unit 1
Lesson 2: How do scientists study dinosaurs?- Where in the world did dinosaurs live?
- Where in the world did dinosaurs live?
- Did dinosaurs travel in herds or packs?
- Did dinosaurs travel in herds or packs?
- How fast were dinosaurs?
- Were dinosaurs warm-blooded?
- Were dinosaurs warm-blooded?
- How fast did dinosaurs grow, and how long did they live?
- How fast did dinosaurs grow, and how long did they live?
- What was dinosaur skin like?
- What color were extinct dinosaurs?
- What color were extinct dinosaurs?
- What were the biggest and smallest dinosaurs?
- Did dinosaurs fight?
- How did dinosaurs reproduce?
- How intelligent were dinosaurs?
- New research points to dinosaurs' colorful past
- New dinosaur research: Microraptor's feather color revealed
- Quiz: How do scientists study dinosaurs?
- Exploration Questions: How do scientists study dinosaurs?
- Answers to Exploration Questions: How do scientists study dinosaurs?
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Did dinosaurs travel in herds or packs?
The most definitive evidence that dinosaurs traveled in groups comes from sequences of fossilized footprints called trackways. Several track sites have now been found that suggest herding behavior in some groups of dinosaurs. At the Davenport Ranch site outside San Antonio, Texas, R. T. Bird of AMNH discovered an amazing set of sauropods tracks in 1940. Detailed analyses of these trackways reveal a herd of 23 sauropods rambling over muddy ground at a pace of about 2 meters per second. The pattern of overlapping tracks indicates that the largest adult sauropods led the herd, followed by smaller individuals. Created by American Museum of Natural History.
Want to join the conversation?
- Is there a difference between a herd and a pack?(9 votes)
- Pack is usually only used for carnivores, while herd tends to be used for herbivores, but there's no strict rule.(10 votes)
- Did the museum add artificial colouring to the footprints (at0:40)? Or is there another reason why these are so red?
Update: 2 Khan Academy users say the red is natural, 2 say the red is added.(5 votes)- They're probably red because they're sandstone. Sandstone can be red.(4 votes)
- How could a dinosaur footprint have lasted millions of years? It seems like just a little weather (rainstorm or such) would wipe them right out!(5 votes)
- I would imagine that the substance that the dinosaur walked in probably hardened over the years making it so their footprints would stay even if it rained.(2 votes)
- In the Jurassic Park movies, velociraptors travel in packs. Is there any evidence to support that? Did velociraptors travel in packs?(1 vote)
- yes they did but their size was exaggerated their 5 ft long and 3 ft tall(1 vote)
Video transcript
Probably our best evidence comes from the
footprint record because dinosaur footprints are very very common
all over the world, and if you go out and you look at them you can
see the flocks of dinosaurs moving in one direction and not only moving in one
direction because, you could say, well you know that this is that the mud
flat right, and you have a dinosaur walks down there
one-day and then his brother walks down there the next day so its preserving if over
a number of days, but in many cases you can tell by the
pattern of overlap of the tracts themselves that that they were made at
the same time, or group of animals which are walking straight and they're
undulating from right to left and stuff and tracking each other so we have a pretty strong evidence that
several different groups of dinosaurs, you know, traveled in flocks. Now, did they all do? No, I mean, just like mammals today, that we have some animals which
herd, we have other animals which are solitary, so it's not they all did but certainly we have evidence that some kinds did.