Sabertooths had super buff arms

Adam Khor

Not really new, but it seems that some X-Ray studies have confirmed that the arms (and generally forequarters) of both true and false sabertooths were particularly muscular, allowing them to wrestle prey to the ground.
Unfortunately, they keep repeating that the teeth would easily "shatter", as if they were made of glass, if they had bitten into bone or even if "prey had struggled". Despite the fact that numerous sabertooth bite marks have been found in the bones and even skulls of numerous animals- including other sabertooths, dire wolves AND humans.

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2012/01/04/wrestling-ninjas-%E2%80%93-why-sabre-toothed-predators-have-massive-arms/

Galvasean

I wonder do the saber teeth lose something in terms of composition during fossilisation which makes them appear much weaker, perhaps a horny sheath of some sort?
It is odd that best testing indicates they could not have penetrated bone, when teeth marks show they did just that!
Reminds me a bit of how The Truth About Killer Dinosaurs TV show reckoned Velociraptor's sickle claw was virtually useless.

Adam Khor

Galvasean wrote: »

I wonder do the saber teeth lose something in terms of composition during fossilisation which makes them appear much weaker, perhaps a horny sheath of some sort?
It is odd that best testing indicates they could not have penetrated bone, when teeth marks show they did just that!
Reminds me a bit of how The Truth About Killer Dinosaurs TV show reckoned Velociraptor's sickle claw was virtually useless.

I, on the other hand, wonder what sort of sad mistake of evolution gave rise to scientists who think they can match Nature's work with clusmy machines, bad CG renderings and pedantry. If they can´t find a way to make THEIR replica work, they assume that Nature couldn´t do better- the claw/fang/whatever was weak and almost useless. Nothing more than arrogance, me thinks.
The bite marks are there; the fact that saberteeth were hunting beasts larger than themselves (which is actually the reason for those sabers) should be enough proof that the fangs were not "weak", that they didn´t "shatter" when prey struggled. Maybe they couldn´t pierce concrete, but they didn´t have to; they were supossed to stab through the flesh of other animals, and if many different linneages of predators developed saber teeth in several points of history, then it should be obvious that they worked just fine.

BTW, I never bought the idea that sabertooths bit only the throat of their prey, as most scientists are saying nowadays. The conical shaped fangs of pantherines and of sabertooth ancestors are good enough for biting through throats- that's what they do today after all. I think the whole point of developing saberteeth is that no matter where they bit, the wound was devastating to the victim. Why evolve sabers (and all that comes with them) if they're going to keep doing what their saber-less ancestors and relatives do with completely normal teeth? Doesn´t make sense to me.