Show Up O ci e Science Service Service Duckbill uc i Dinosaur Had a Lots of o Teeth but Lived on Plants ants I Washington Duckbill dinoI dinosaurs dinosaurs dino dino- I saurs weren't at all like ducks when it came to the matter of i teeth They had about the finest dental mills any animal in the world world has ever possessed C. C jW W. W Gilmore curator of vertebrate verte- verte brate paleontology at the United UnitI Unit- Unit I fed ed States National museum i pointed out in the course of an anI I illustrated lecture here Two thousand teeth ranged in rows I both horizontal and vertical 1 formed a fair average equipment equipment equipment equip equip- ment for one of them But it was all right even for the creatures that inhabited the earth at the same time Duckbill dinosaurs dinosaurs dinosaurs dino- dino saurs saurs were quite harmless feeding feed- feed i ling ing entirely on plants Much more formidable were the fewer I teeth in the jaws of the tyrannosaurs saurs their sL inch six inch spikes shaped flike like barracuda teeth but ten times bigger were terrible of flesh To get back to the duckbills they not only had these batteries of many hundreds of teeth ready for immediate immediate immediate imme- imme diate action at all times but they had shad plenty more where they came from If a tooth was worn out or broken it was immediately re re- re- re placed Back of all the teeth were tooth buds ready to grow new ones 50 so a duckbill never had to worry about a toothless old age Teeth Like a Rake A much bigger dinosaur also a plant-eater plant yet with fewer and weaker teeth was Diplodocus of hi h r-i r th N l' l a museum Ct has Ie a r I w n c I e fine skeleton teeth were all in the front end of his jaws and they were slender and rake He had no real chewing teeth at all aU It is therefore conjectured that Diplodocus Diplodocus Dip Dip- raked up soft vegetation from the swamps and shallow lakes where he wallowed and gulped the mess down whole to be ground up in his gizzard by the bushel or so of stones he habitually kept inside for that purpose Not all the vegetarian dinosaurs were creatures of mild and inoffensive inoffensive inoffensive habits The which had formidable horns projecting projecting projecting project project- ing forward from their heads and wide bony frills to protect their necks must have been the wild bulls of the Age of Reptiles Mr Gilmore told of numerous finds of horned dinosaur skeletons which show broken ribs punctured frills and horns snapped off all with evidence evidence evidence evi evi- evi- evi dence of healing afterwards which indicated that these injuries had been received in the course of truculently truculently truculently truc truc- active lives |