Did sauropods have feathers? Did sauropods have trunks? Today we will look at some of the newest theories surrounding this famous group of long-necked dinosaurs and give you the answers you need.
Q. Did sauropods have feathers?
A. No evidence to date has been found that they possess feathers. However, we do know that the dinosaur’s common ancestor had feathers, which still makes it a possibility. Scales, however, seem to be dominant with these behemoths. Multiple scale impressions have been found, including those inside their eggs – which turns down the baby fluff arguement.
However, the skin patches don’t display the entire bodies of the sauropods. Like large theropods, sauropods would need a way to get rid of excess heat due to their large size. So they probably have the same amount of feathers as an African elephant has fur – not a lot. Sauropods probably did have feathers, but very very little of them. If they did have feathers, they would probably only possess quills, and those only to certain parts of their bodies.
Q. Did sauropods have trunks?
A. This theroy has been circulating around for a while now. Short answer: no. At first the theory seems plausible – why are the nostrils placed so high up and why are they so big. The skull looks just like an elephants! Except for two things – teeth, and necks. Firstly, elephants have teeth entirely designed for chewing and grinding vegetation. Sauropods’ teeth are for stripping vegetation from trees. The purpose of a trunk is to strip leaves.
Secondly – necks. The elephant’s trunk is used to reach up and grasp leaves. Sauropods eveolved necks to do that job for them. So why evolve two things to reach high and get at food. In the end, a sauropod’s head and neck were just like an elephant’s trunk. So, no, sauropods did not have trunks.
Q. Is Mokele mbembe a sauropod?
A. The famous extant dinosaur said to be found in the swamps of the Congo jungle is a definite fantasy. We’ll cover cyptids like it in other articles. However, regardless of its reality, is it a sauropod? Although it is almost always depicted as a sauropod, it cannot be a sauropod. This is because sauropods were not adapted for water, but for the open plains, and the constrainsts of the jungle would prove incompatable with a sauropod dinosaur. Some have identified mokele mbembe as an Apatosaurus, which further disproves the notion as Apatosaurus lived in North America.
So there is a few questions about sauropods answered, with a bit of cryptozoology thrown in for fun. Sauropods are an amazing and fascinating group of animals and it’s always nice to speak about them here at the Tyrannosaur University.
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