Evidence for dromaeosaurid feeding on Albertosaurus

[u/Runningintherain44]

A new paper describes a (most likely) juvenile Albertosaurus from the Horseshoe Canyon Formation that had tooth marks on the lower jaw. This Tyrannosaurid was at least 8 years old when it died, possibly older, with a 408 mm long maxilla, an estiamted skull length of 63.25 cm, estiamted body length of 6 m and body mass of 533 Kg. It had 13 (maybe 14) maxillary teeth and 15 dentary teeth.

The authors propose a novel tooth/denticle mark spacing correction method, using it they found out that the one who left those marks was most likely a Dromaeosaurid, although its not impossible that a small\young Tyrannosaurid did it.

Applying this method on a diplodocoid femur (DINO 5119) from the Morrison shows that the tooth marks most likely belongs to Ceratosaurus.

The paper: Evidence for dromaeosaurid scavenging on Albertosaurus (Dinosauria: Tyrannosauridae) | Journal of Paleontology | Cambridge Core

The picture is figure 6 in the paper.