Large Trove Of Dino Eggs And Embyros Discovered

Masem writes: "CNN is reporting that a large number of unhatched and partially broken dino eggs have been discovered in Argentina. The eggs are from titanosaurs, most likely fossilized by mud in an overflowing river shortly before the eggs were to hatch, thus leading to good preservation of the embyros. This is the first opportunity for scientists to investigate the infancy of dinosaur growth."

Comments

Look at the egg size.

[mfarah]

This drew my attention:

Chiappe says the eggs were about the size of softballs, [...]

Proportionally to the adult size, birds' eggs are bigger. OTOH, fish's eggs are smaller. Is it just me, or the relative size of the egg has grown in the evolution of egg-laying animals?

Re:Look at the egg size.

[Anonymous Coward]

There must be practical limits on the maximum size of an egg, though... the baby creature needs to be able to break out which limits the thickness, which in turn would limit the size if it's not going to become overly fragile. Of course a longer growth period within the egg would result in stronger babies, but I'm sure all the factors come together at some point.

Assuming that's the case, and given the fairly massive adult size of these dinosaurs, it's natural that the relative size of adult to egg is much greater when compared with much smaller creatures such as birds.

Having said that, those eggs probably aren't much bigger than a Kiwi egg (which has the largest egg size compared to body size among birds) so there's probably something in what you're saying :)

Probably reptile eggs and bird eggs tend to differ like that.

Re:Look at the egg size.

[ianchaos]

There is one more thing to take into account when looking at the adult and the size of the eggs laid, and that is the number of eggs laid at once. While an ostrich will lay up to 10 eggs each with an average size of 3.3 pounds whereas an alligator will lay about 45 eggs in one sitting each about the size of a golf ball. There is a dinosaur egg in the American Museum of Natural History in New York that's about the size of basketball. There is no idea what dinosaur it comes from or how many eggs it laid at one time though. Egg to adult size ratio has to take into account whether the adult will be taking care of the eggs during incubation which can be viewed as a way of increasing the survival average and thus fewer eggs need to be laid. Reptiles tend not to monitor the progress of their young and often lay a large # of eggs to increase the chances of the overall survival of the species. Although there are always exceptions to the rule some have seen potential evidence that the diplodocus, who were believed to be herd animals, did stay with the eggs until they hatched.