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Bite force of sauropods?; How hard do you think can sauropods bite?
Topic Started: May 2 2013, 03:47 AM (4,932 Views)
SpinoInWonderland
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How hard, do you think, sauropods can bite?

Can they reach surprisingly high bite forces, for the largest sauropods at least? Or are they wayyy low?

Can a large sauropod hypothetically break someone's arm with it's bite?


If you ask me, I think the very largest of sauropods, like Amphicoelias fragillimus, can bite with a force comparable to hyenas, and that creatures like Europasaurus have bite forces comparable to that of a human child...

Hypothesize and speculate!
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theropod
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An Amphicoelias/Parabrontopodus-sized sauropod's skull would physically dwarf that of Baryonyx or Suchomimus. These animals also are not known for having particularly robustly constructed jaws, built for strong biting, hence I don't find it too unreasonable to assume a vary large sauropod would have had a stronger bite force.
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MightyMaus
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Camarasaurids and Brachiosaurids probably had decent bite forces, but Diplodocids were pretty weak. I'b bet a big 50+ ton sauropod could bite hard enough to break some bones.
Edited by MightyMaus, May 7 2013, 08:47 AM.
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Shaochilong
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brolyeuphyfusion
May 2 2013, 11:45 PM
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May 2 2013, 04:37 AM
In that case, the alleged Brontodopus 75 meters long (although perhaps a bit exaggerated) would have a bite much stronger than that of Tyrannosaurus and other giant Theropods.
That claim of is yours severely exaggerated. A 250-tonne sauropod, if theropod's guess about a 1-tonne sauropod is correct, would have had a bite force of ~7940 newtons...

Now, you may say that animals get more robust musculature as they get larger, which is true, but even taking that into account, I don't really see sauropods getting past the 10 kilonewton mark...

So, the largest sauropods(Parabrontopodus distercii - sized) may outperform most abelisaurs and spinosaurids* in terms of bite force, but it's a stretch to say that they would outbite Big Al, let alone Tyrannosaurus...

*Sakamoto estimated the bite force of Baryonyx(which has a ~91.5 cm skull) at ~3870 newtons, scaling to Suchomimus(120 cm skull) would yield ~6656 newtons of bite force...
Pretty much this. A sauropod's bite might parallel or exceed one of the weaker-biting theropods like abelisaurids, but it would almost certainly not overtake an allosaurid's bite force, never mind a tyrannosaurid's.
Edited by Shaochilong, May 8 2013, 01:42 AM.
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theropod
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Depends on the allosaurid, it might just overtake something like MOR936 at a more conservative estimate for the theropod. I don't actually know why everyone seems to think abelisaurs had such weak bites, were's that from? That might be true for some specialized forms (carnotaurus, rugops...) but certainly not all.
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MightyMaus
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Also, Parabrontopodus, wasn't nearly as big as Amphicoelias or the Broome titanosaur.
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SpinoInWonderland
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theropod
May 8 2013, 05:01 AM
I don't actually know why everyone seems to think abelisaurs had such weak bites, were's that from?
Probably from Majungasaurus' wimpy lower jaw...
Edited by SpinoInWonderland, Jun 2 2013, 03:06 AM.
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theropod
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Not all of them have a whimpy lower jaw. Apart from that, carnosaurs and the majority of other theropods usually don't have robust mandibulae either.
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SpinoInWonderland
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theropod
Jun 2 2013, 03:00 AM
Not all of them have a whimpy lower jaw. Apart from that, carnosaurs and the majority of other theropods usually don't have robust mandibulae either.
Yeah, they pretty much generalized abelisaurs based on the stuff Cau wrote iirc, some of Verdugo's posts have it...
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ffejgao995
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DinosaurMichael
May 2 2013, 03:54 AM
I would assume their bite force wouldn't be very strong as they ate leaves from trees and all that. Thereby not needing such a strong bite. Still I wouldn't want to stick my hand into it's mouth or any animal's for that matter.
I'm with you on this. Sauropods are herbivores so no strong bite force needed. I mean, horses eat just hay, grass, corn and things like that but who would put his/her fingers into a horse's mouth? And sauropods are way bigger than horses.
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DinosaurFan95
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Diplodocids had weak jaws, mainly used to rake leaves.
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Grimace
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Ausar
May 2 2013, 04:47 AM
Sauropods didn't chew, thus they wouldn't really have strong jaw muscles, hence their bite forces probably wouldn't be extremely high. However, I agree that they would have bite forces like the one broly suggested.
Thats not how it works at all necessarily.

Iguanas do the same "herbivores who don't chew" thing, but are known for having really godawful nasty bites and slicing people's hands open.

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DinosaurFan95
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But iguanaskulls are build differently than sauropod skulls.
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Grimace
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Allosaurusatrox
Mar 19 2015, 04:50 AM
But iguanaskulls are build differently than sauropod skulls.
True, I was just poiting out "not chewing" doesn't mean an animal doesnt have a damaging bite.
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DinosaurFan95
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I know, I was just throwing differing jaw structures into the equation.
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Ausar
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Grimace
Mar 17 2015, 11:59 AM
Ausar
May 2 2013, 04:47 AM
Sauropods didn't chew, thus they wouldn't really have strong jaw muscles, hence their bite forces probably wouldn't be extremely high. However, I agree that they would have bite forces like the one broly suggested.
Thats not how it works at all necessarily.

Iguanas do the same "herbivores who don't chew" thing, but are known for having really godawful nasty bites and slicing people's hands open.

That was a really old post. But I have no idea why I said that :blink: . By that logic, no carnivore could bite hard.
Edited by Ausar, Feb 10 2017, 02:13 AM.
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