Modelling equid/ruminant competition in the fossil record

It has been argued that the Late Cretaceous dinosaurs from Transylvania were affected by dwarfism as a consequence of their evolution in an insular habit. However, several bones from Nopcsa's collections housed in London and Budapest shows that some Transylvanian saltasaurids reached lengths of 10–15 m. These multi-ton animals can hardly be considered as dwarfs, even by dinosaurian standards. It is suggested here that taphonomical biases, possibly linked to the existence of age-classed communities among sauropod populations, explain why the vast majority of recovered bones are of young individuals.