Can a snake prey on a dinosaur? The answer is ‘yes.’The remains of a snake and dinosaur fossil and dinosaur eggs provide unequivocal evidence that a particular species of snake that lived about 67 million years ago at Dholi Dungri village, about 130 km from Ahmedabad, devoured sauropods. The snake did not eat fully-grown sauropods; it preyed on dinosaurs just as they were hatching from eggs. It coiled around the prey to kill and swallow it. “We infer that the crushed egg encircled by the snake was exited by the sauropod hatchling found adjacent to it,” says a paper published online on March 2 in the PLoS (Public Library of Science) Biology journal. Modern day pythons use the same technique to coil around and tighten the grip on the prey so that it suffocates and dies.
Eating behaviour
The study is significant as the nearly complete remains of the snake — preserved in a nest of a sauropod along with a half-metre-long dinosaur hatchling lying next to the snake and two unbroken eggs — are unequivocal evidence of its eating behaviour. It also provides evidence of the evolutionary transition from basal snakes to modern-day derived macrostomatans like pythons. The new snake fossil — named Sanajeh indicus (Sanaj means ancient, jeh means gape) — from the late Cretaceous rocks measures 3.5-metre-long.
Important feature
One of the most important features that enable macrostomatans to prey on animals bigger than a deer is their wide gape. Fully grown pythons have excellent jaw adaptations and elongated skulls that give them a gape as wide as 60 cm. “The gape of Sanajeh indicus is approximately 16 cm,” said Dhananjay M. Mohabey, Director of the Palaeontology Division, Geological Survey of India, Nagpur, and one of the authors of the paper. “The lower jaw of S. indicus is 12 cm long…it’s a fairly long jaw. There are other morphological features that make the jaws highly mobile and flexible…and give a wide gape of 16 cm.” Unlike the jaws of basal snakes that open like a hinge, the upper and lower jaws of S. indicus can be moved laterally as well. This lateral movement gives the jaw mobility.
For further: www.hindu.com/2010/03/03/stories/2010030357292000.htm
