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Tomozaurus β Ceratopsian manus study
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Published: 2012-06-26 03:52:55 +0000 UTC; Views: 5584; Favourites: 122; Downloads: 127
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Description
Something quickly whipped up for Jobaria at Hell Creek (www.hellcreek.tk).Showing the structure of the manus of certopsians using Triceratops horridus as an example.
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Comments: 20
This makes me feel somewhat assured that I got the 'hands' right on my first ceratopsian reconstruction
This is a great, simple yet useful reference
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The footprint seems to suggest more of a robust fleshy "heel" to the manus than is present in your medial view life restoration. The unguals might also be a bit more buried in flesh.
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I think you're reading the footprint wrong, I did the same thing at first, the 'heel' looking part is actually the end pads of the toes. Look at the bits that are touching the ground in life life reconstructions, it's those. The bits that "stick out" (the parts I've written the digit numbers in are) are just the claws, not the fingers.
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Your medial view still reads to me like the back of the foot would be slightly concave, and not slightly convex as the track shows. But as it is just a drawing, there's no way to really prove that. Interesting point about the claws.
Something I just noticed is that you seem to have drawn the fourth and fifth metacarpals as part of the fingers, but the metacarpals are the palm bones. The external crease between them probably shouldn't exist (or at least, should be a lot less prominent), and the visible fingers should be a lot shorter.
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That 'crease' is just folds in the skin, not meant to represent a visible external barrier between fingers and metacarpals, although it lines up with them. The fingers should be shorter though.
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Unfortunately, Tomozaurus, you have misunderstood the ceratopsian footprints. What you have drawn is the "pes" print instead of the "manus" print. Take a look at this [link] , paid special attention to figure 5. The pes print looks almost identical to the one you traced for your diagram. However, the manus print does produce a slight/faint concave palm impression (as in most quadruped dinosaurs...). Here is another example of a ceratopsian print set ([link] ). The only element that seems right about your manus print diagram is the number of digits touching the substrate.
By the way here is an interesting paper ([link] ), figure 4 from the paper actually shows a set of thyreophoran manus prints which indicates the animal had claws on digit 1 to 4. Is this the only exception to the 3 claws on the hand rule for archosaurs? (I highly doubt it after seeing these prints.) Perhaps these were made by other reptiles? I wonder what else could it be?
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Shit, you're right! That makes much more sense.
Jobaria wanted a pes diagram as well anyway, so I think I'll redo the whole thing with this information in mind.
Thanks for the extra reference and the info on the supposed 4 claw ankylosaur print, the latter in particular I'd been looking for.
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Nice work, this will certainly come in handy (oh crap did I just unintentionally make a bad pun?)
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hahaha it would seem you did.
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Digit VI...?! 
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Cool, but you mean "IV" (4), not "VI" (6). (Those crazy Romans!)
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It's a typo, thanks for pointing it out, will be fixed.
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I always thought you count from inwards to outwards, so Digit IV and V would be the clawless ones that donΒ΄t touch the ground.
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And you'd be correct in that.
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Reminds me an old Greg Paul's work on dinosaurs hands and footprints.
Very usefull, me likes it
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