this post was submitted on 07 Mar 2024
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I think it's more about the pressure.
But I can definitely endure a pile of soldiers jumping on top of me (get your mind out of the gutter we had our clothes on), and the total weight was definitely more than 250kg. It wouldn't be distributed as evenly though, because the weight would be distributed in a smaller area.
I wouldn't bet anything on a fight between me and one of those, but if I had to battle one to the death, either one of these or a t-rex, I'd choose one of these.
My logic is that if it just tries gobbling me up (as birbs and snakes tend to do), I could just slice it open from the inside (realistically I would be crushed probably and unable to do that but it sounds badass so I'm going with it).
Dodging the pecking while armored really well in proper biker gear would be a bit like fencing, as you'd have the baseball bat to crack the beak/bill anytime it missed/glanced.
Is definitely imagine humans being more nimble, so I wouldn't run, unless there was some forest or something to run into.
I'm pretty sure you can get driven over by a the wheel of a car in proper biker gear and be relatively fine. And even small cars weigh 4x what this birbski does.
But again, I wouldn't want to and wouldn't place a bet on myself, I'd just prefer fighting one to fighting a t-rex, which I'd probably have a hard time taking down even armed with basic infantry weaponry. (Meaning like 7.62)
I would think that it would be on the easier side to survive an attack from this thing, maybe, but harder to beat it in a fight, as any present danger that you pose to it can kind of just be circumvented by it choosing to fly away and then hit you when you're unawares. So I think hunting strategy would probably play a pretty big factor in this as well.
It depends on how this thing attacks prey. If it's a bird of prey, I'd kind of assume that it would dive prey and scoop it up, rather than landing and then attacking it's prey, and it's much harder to dodge a large bird than it is to kind of, fence away chicken-like pecking, as you've kind of described here. Much like how pelicans dive bomb surface fish.
I think it's also probably more likely that this thing would snap at you compared to pecking, which is probably going to be harder to dodge, depending on how much it opens its mouth, and what angles it tries to hit you at. Vertical snapping is pretty ineffective at hitting vertical targets like humans. I'd imagine it might be pretty capable of flesh wounds, though.
I agree that you can probably survive being stepped on by this thing, but some of the artists' renderings have claws, and in combination with the pressure and even just the size and probable strength of this animal, I'd imagine it could hit you with a pretty large gash, which might kill you without medical attention. Let's also consider that, even though you can experience a car rolling over you, and cars routinely weight more and spread their force over a similar surface area, a better analogue, along those lines, might be if we dropped a car on you, tire-first. If this thing decides to step on you, it's not putting down just 250 kg, it's putting down 250kg, plus momentum, plus muscular force.
So, overall, I'm not quite as optimistic of your chances as you seem to be.
I'm not really too optimistic, I'm just depressed and haven't got much to live for, so I haven't much to fear.
That being said, I do think I would lose yeah, but how glorious would it be to win?
Now to the theory. Do we actually know it was a predator? Modern birds of prey all have either very strong, crooked, beaks and/or talons. These have very long, toothless beaks. Personally, I think it more likely they were a beast that scavenged and used opportunities (much like a seagull), instead of actually hunting prey.
If that is the case, then they wouldn't be optimised for fighting. You make a good point in that killing one might be hard because it could so easily get away. Buuut... unlike modern birds, these use all 4 limbs to support themselves while on the ground. If you managed to a nice blow with a baseball bat on it's forelegs while it's on the ground? It might not be able to take off again, or even walk around properly.
Like... even if you dislike/fear birds, how many people arr afraid of being "bitten" by a seagull?
Literally toothless.
I'm not sure if there are theories to how this species hunted, but I looked for reference in https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quetzalcoatlus this article about (I presume) a different massive pterosaur.