what did dinosaurs eat

what did dinosaurs eat

1 year ago 81
Nature

Dinosaurs had a diverse diet, but it depended on their size and the available resources. Some dinosaurs ate lizards, turtles, eggs, or early mammals, while others hunted other dinosaurs or scavenged dead animals. However, most dinosaurs were herbivores and ate plants, including evergreen conifers, ferns, mosses, horsetail rushes, cycads, ginkos, and flowering plants. Some dinosaurs had flat teeth to strip, slice, and grind foliage, while others ate stones to grind up tough vegetation and make it easy to digest. Some dinosaurs were omnivores and ate meat, plants, insects, fish, and eggs. The larger the dinosaur, the more likely it was to be a vegetarian, such as the sauropods that ate little more than ancient plants like cycads, ferns, and ginkgos. Some meat-eating dinosaurs were cannibalistic and ate members of their own species. The exact diet of dinosaurs is difficult to determine, but scientists can infer their diet from fossilized stomach remains or coprolites (fossilized dung) .

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