Fossil-Eating Plants

Discovery-News.com: Plants love dinosaur bones as much as we do ? maybe more! James Williams gets the dirt.

For more science news stories, check out http://www.discovery-news.com

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• dino
• bone
• dig
• excavation
• montana
• bad
• lands
• trowl
• fossil
• brush
• jack
• horner
• kasey
• dee
• gardner
• james
• williams

[Willliwa]

if you were a plant, would you eat boring old rock or eat 75 million year old nutrient rich bone?

[punbaca]

bone apetit :P

[helema23]

mabey its gods way to tell us to stop studying old bones and worry bout the people lookin like walking skelitons?

[PirateKing1256]

The plant suck out everything. Cool.

[champwagner]

fucken plants what will they think of next

[victorcelmare]

the cycle of life :D !

[magick205]

@mrpotatohead34: That's where the science of comparative anatomy comes in. Sometimes all they need to do is mirror the missing parts (this is common in large, fragmented invertbrates). In vertbrate fossils, they look at closely related species and try to fill-in the blanks that way. Look at the reconstructions of many hominid species. Entire skulls are not found so they extrapolate based on what is known from that and other primate species.

[mrpotatohead34]

but what if they cant find the whole dinosaur or fossil that has alot of bones?

[magick205]

@mrpotatohead34: Yeah. Fossilization is really a numbers game. Enough of a particular species need to exist in an environment that some of them fall into places where they become fossils. Then enough of those need to survive in the earth long enough without alteration and be brought back to the surface and weathered out. Finailly, somebody needs to see and recognize the fossil for what it is. This why real fossils fetch so much money, esp if they are in good condition.

[mrpotatohead34]

great point there :)

[RossRoss12345]

TASTY!!!

[Draious]

lol so lame it's fun