A recent, crowd funded, examination of the remains of an adolescent Daspletosaurus show that the animal had a hard life and not many allies. The research shows that the Daspletosaurus, a cousin of the tyrannosaurus rex, suffered numerous injuries during its life, at least some of them inflicted by another Daspletosaurus. At least part of the animal was also eaten after death, apparently by another tyrannosaur.
Daspletosaurus lived in, what is now, Canada between 77 and 74 million years ago, during the Late Cretaceous Period. Adult animals were 26-30 feet long and weight between 1.8 and 4 tons which makes them slightly smaller than their famous relative the Tyrannosaurus Rex.
Operating such an incredibly large body required massive amounts of energy, which required a lot of eating. Daspletosaurus is thought to have been both a predator and a scavenger.
The particular individual in question was found in Alberta, Canada. At the time of its death, it had not reached adulthood and would have been a ‘sub-adult’ or a teenager in human terms. It was about 20 feet long and would have weighed about 1,100 lbs.
The animal had suffered numerous injuries to its skull, from a variety of causes. However, several can be attributed to bites some of which are similar to the shape of tyrannosaur bites. One bite in particular, to the back of the head, had broken off part of the skull and left a tooth shaped puncture would through the bone. Because the area had started to heal, prior to death, researchers know that this was not a fatal would.
“This animal clearly had a tough life suffering numerous injuries across the head including some that must have been quite nasty. The most likely candidate to have done this is another member of the same species, suggesting some serious fights between these animals during their lives,” said David Hone from Queen Mary, University of London in a statement.
Horne is lead author of the new paper published in the Open Access journal PeerJ.
Although there is no evidence that the animal was killed by another of its species, there is evidence that another tyrannosaur tried to eat it. The skull, jaw and other bones of the Daspletosaurus show that some time after death, once decay had started, a large tyrannosaur ate part of it.
Combat and cannibalism between large predators, including tyrannosaurs, has already been established. However this appears to be the first specimen with evidence of both in the same individual.
The research was funded by crowd funding through Experiment.com, a site similar to Kickstarter for unfunded scientific research. The proposed projects seeking funding on the site include physical and biological science, social science, economics, political science and more. According to Bill Gates, “this solution helps close the gap for potential and promising, but unfunded projects.”
