Dinosaur voices?

Linnaeus

Did dinosaurs have "voices"? Crested hadrosaurs were probably capable of trumpeting; but did other dinosaurs have vocal chords which would have enabled them to utter sounds?

I think that most reptiles today are of the "silent" type. Wonder if prehistoric reptiles were more loquacious?

Adam Khor

Linnaeus wrote: »

Crested hadrosaurs were probably capable of trumpeting; but did other dinosaurs have vocal chords which would have enabled them to utter sounds?

You don´t need mammal-style vocal chords to make sounds.

Linnaeus wrote: »

I think that most reptiles today are of the "silent" type. Wonder if prehistoric reptiles were more loquacious?

Most reptiles today are squamates (lizards and snakes) and they are not closely related to dinosaurs.

If you look at the closest relatives of dinosaurs, crocodilians, they are extremely vocal; they don´t have the same vocal chords as we do but they do have what's known as vocal folds in their larynx, which allows them to growl, roar, bellow, squeak, etc. Some crocodilian species are more vocal than others (American gators being probably the most "talkative") but they are all capable of producing different sounds, and the male gharial even has a small resonating chamber at the tip of its snout to amplify its mating calls.





As for birds, they are living dinosaurs and also very vocal; they too lack vocal cords, and produce their sounds with a special structure called the syrinx, which is similar to the larynx but evolved separately. So maybe dinosaurs had vocal folds like crocodilians, or maybe a syrinx like birds, or maybe something intermediate between the two; or perhaps even each dinosaur group had something different. But chances are high that they did communicate vocally, and may have been quite noisy, especially if all the apparent resonating chamber-like structures are anything to go by.

Also, consider this; many large animals today communicate via infrasounds, which are sounds so deep that we humans can´t hear them without technological aid, although we may sense them in the form of vibrations. Amongst the creatures that communicate via infrasounds, there's giraffes (usually considered to be mute!), rhinos, large tortoises, elephants, whales, tigers and lions (it's been suggested even that tigers use the infrasounds to momentarily paralyze their enemies), and most intriguingly, crocodilians and large birds such as cassowaries and ostriches.
Also, studies of the ear bones of some dinosaurs (including Tyrannosaurus rex) indicate that they were particularly sensitive to low frequency sounds, meaning they were listening to a lot of infrasounds, and most likely, producing them as well.

There's more going on than our limited senses would have us think...

Linnaeus

Thanks for this info. I can accept these facts. But you have claimed that birds are dinosaurs... Oh help us, Father Linnaeus! Pardon the cladistic heresies of Adam Khor. Some day I hope to convert this wayward fellow back to the blessed orthodoxy of Traditional Classification.;)

Said the offended little sparrow who chirps outside my window: "Who's he calling a dinosaur?":D

Adam Khor

Linnaeus wrote: »

Thanks for this info. I can accept these facts. But you have claimed that birds are dinosaurs...

You're not confused, you just want to start that debate again...