Page 172 - Introduction to Paleobiology and The Fossil Record

FOSSIL FORM AND FUNCTION 159

(a)

(b)
Figure 6.14 Evidence for a rodent–plant interaction from the Eocene. (a) Seed of the water plant
Stratiotes carrying a neat hole gnawed by a rodent, from the Eocene Bembridge Limestone
Formation of the Isle of Wight, southern England. (b) A hole gnawed by a modern woodmouse,
showing the same kind of perpendicular narrow grooves made by the tips of the upper incisors.
Scale bars, 1 mm. (Courtesy of Margaret Collinson.)

been very revealing. The teeth are sharp and
curved, and the edges carry serrations like a Review questions
steak knife – clear evidence of meat eating. 1 How are fossil species told apart? Look
Close study of the teeth also reveals minute up information on any pair of species
scratches that were produced by the bones within a single genus (such as the human
and other tough food material in the diet species Homo erectus and Homo sapiens;

(Barrett & Rayfield 2006). Bones of the the dinosaurs Saurolophus osborni from
prey offer clues too: some examples show that North America and Saurolophus angu-
T. rex could penetrate deep into the bones of stirostris from Mongolia; or any of the
its victims, but also that it chomped and tore 10 or more species of the trilobite
at the flesh in such a way that it sometimes Paradoxides), and write down as many

left dozens of tooth marks as it stripped the distinguishing characters as you can
bones. All these circumstantial discoveries track down. How easy are these morpho-
add to a rich picture of how one fossil animal logical characters to observe in the
fed. specimens?