Evidence Suggests That Tyrannosaurus Dinosaurs Ate Each Other

Those serrated teeth mean the animal eating the tyrannosaur was most likely another theropod dinosaur, “and the width of the larger grooves suggests the traces were made by a tyrannosaur”, researchers write.

Since all the other dinosaur bones so far recovered from the Lance Formation paleontological site in Wyoming come from just two species, i.e. Tyrannosaurus rex and Nanotyrannus lancensis, one of these lost predators must be the culprit. In 2010, other tyrannosaur bones were found with marks that could only have been made by another large, carnivorous dinosaur, with the tyrannosaurs being the only species of that type in the area.

The groove marks are interesting, with evidence showing that they have been caused by an animal tearing the flesh off the bone “at an angle perpendicular to the bone”.

Once the serrated teeth were confirmed, researchers omitted the crocodiles, another animal which could have given such large marks on the bone.

“There is just nothing else that has such big teeth”, McLain noted.

The most scary dinosaurs – Tyrannosaur also know as T-Rex was a cannibal, making it even more scary.

The findings will be presented at the annual meeting of The Geological Society of America on Sunday.

McLain said: “Exactly who did the eating that day, in the Late Cretaceous, could still be sorted out by the same grooves”.

The serration grooves are a valuable clue to the size of the animal who owned the teeth.

Because of this pattern of serration grooves, the researchers were able to infer about the size of the animal responsible for the teeth marks by using serration size approaches that previously worked when identifying Komodo dragons. It is believed it craved meat so much it ate individuals from its own species. “And since Tyrannosauruses are the only large predators in these formations, it is pretty straightforward”. Perhaps that is why researchers are still not a 100% sure on whether T-Rex had a cannibalistic nature or not.

Meanwhile, a few scientists are well convinced that it is only a matter of time that their researches will give out the fact that young smaller T-Rex often got eaten by giant hungry T-Rex.

A few scientists say the dino-on-dino feasting happened after fights, a meal that would help the cannibal victor because you are killing a competitor and getting a free meal at the same time.