Biomechanical size limit for sauropod dinosaurs

[Vladimír Socha]

Good day!

I was trying to find the right reference for the widely used (guess)estimate of a biomechanical weight limit for giant sauropods (and terrestrial animals at the same time). Of course there's a bizzare value of 1000 tonnes in Hokkanen (1986), but that aplies for some kind of hypothetical "blob", certainly not walking, functioning quadruped (see https://www.miketaylor.org.uk/dino/hokkanen/Size-Hokkanen.html). In various sources you can find a range of 120 to 140 tonnes as the most plausible biomechanical limit for the mass of any giant sauropod. If it was heavier, it would not be allegedly able to move, breathe and/or support itself standing up.

Anyway, I haven't been able to find any reference for this 120, 130 or 140 tonne estimate. Recently, Mr. Paul published similar results for Bruhathkayosaurus (and Maraapunisaurus) IIRC, but those numbers are emerging for at least 20 years now. Does anyone know, where do these come from and what is the current predominant opinion on this topic?

Thank you in advance, VS.

https://dinosaurusblog.com

[Mike Taylor]

As far as I recall, Hokannen's is still the only attempt, however crude, to put a number of the maximum theoretical mass of a sauropod. (I'm CCing Matt Wedel who may remember something I don't.)

If I'm right that no-one's seriously attempted this for 45 years, that probably tells us something about the difficulty of the problem.

The one thing I'm confident is that the moment someone does publish a theoretical limit of (say) 120 tonnes, someone will immediately discover sauropod remains from an animal bigger than that.

-- Mike.

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[Vladimír Socha]

And that's the most important reason to publish it - because only then a truly gigantic sauropods will start to emerge in the fossil record :-)

More seriously - is anything new with the giant Argentinian titanosaur discovered in 2021 and supposedly larger than Argentinosaurus huinculensis holotype? 

Reference:  Otero, A.; et al. (2021). Report of a giant titanosaur sauropod from the Upper Cretaceous of Neuquén Province, Argentina. Cretaceous Research. 104754. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cretres.2021.104754

Dne pondělí 7. července 2025 v 11:28:04 UTC+2 uživatel Mike Taylor napsal:

[Mike Taylor]

On Mon, 7 Jul 2025 at 11:33, Vladimír Socha <vladimir....@gmail.com> wrote:

And that's the most important reason to publish it - because only then a truly gigantic sauropods will start to emerge in the fossil record :-)

Yes indeed!

More seriously - is anything new with the giant Argentinian titanosaur discovered in 2021 and supposedly larger than Argentinosaurus huinculensis holotype?

Reference:  Otero, A.; et al. (2021). Report of a giant titanosaur sauropod from the Upper Cretaceous of Neuquén Province, Argentina. Cretaceous Research. 104754. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cretres.2021.104754

I don't know of anything.

-- Mike.

[Justin Tweet]

Tell it to wait its turn! It's been almost 30 years and I'm still waiting for MAU-Pv-AC-01, the fabled "titanosaur with a skull and complete vertebral column to Caudal 65".

-Justin 

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Justin Tweet

Equatorial Minnesota, home of The Compact Thescelosaurus

[Mike Taylor]

For that matter, it's been 20 years since that idiot Taylor gave an SVPCA talk about the NHM's Tendaguru titanosauriform, and he still hasn't got the darned thing published.

-- Mike.

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[Gregory Paul]

And he should! 

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[Mike Habib]

I don’t recall anything, either. But I can say that both Matt and I agree (we’ve discussed this) that the theoretical structural limit is probably not mechanical support, but rather, cardiovascular perfusion and/or neural control. 

Cheers,

—Mike H.

Michael B. Habib, MS PhD
Research Associate, Dinosaur Institute
LA County Museum of Natural History
900 W Exposition Blvd. Los Angeles, 90007

Adjunct Professor, Biology

College of the Canyons

26455 Rockwell Canyon Rd, Santa Clarita, CA 91355

michae...@canyons.edu

biology...@gmail.com
+1 (443) 280-0181

On Jul 7, 2025, at 2:28 AM, Mike Taylor <saur...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Gregory Paul]

I cannot remember her name, but a neural expert once told me the nerve speed problem can be dealth with by very long chords. 

A nonmechanical size limit may be the floral resources that can be split among adult individuals. That tall sauropods could access to much flora may be a reason they were able to get so huge. Extreme size sauropods were more long lasting than similar size whales that appear to be limited to the Pleistocene. 

GSPaul

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.

[Mike Taylor]

Along these lines, see this SV-POW! post: https://svpow.com/2022/04/13/why-are-elephants-so-small/

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