Was T-rex a predator or a scavenger or both?

Question

Was T-rex a predator or a scavenger or both?

Answer 1

they where a band

Answer 2

The T-rex was too large to be just a scavenger I would assume it was both.  

Answer 3

people always assumed they were a predator. as they increased studies they realized it was to heavy to catch any prey so it was turned to a scavenger.

they recently discovered there bones were hollow like a birds thats why they are more related to birds then anything, so it was determined as a predator again.

it is now viewed as both as it is able to catch prey because hollow bones equal lighter weight and therefore runs faster. but like any predator weather its sharks, lions or crocodiles they will go for the easiest food, and scavange

Answer 4

But...if so many of the prey animals are on a similar scale, how does that make T-Rex too big and heavy? I don't imagine one would have too tough a job of chasing down what was available at the time.

Must have something to do with those weak little arms...?

Answer 5

There are extremely few animals that are purely scavengers.  I can't even name one that's not an insect.  The whole T rex scavenger nonsense came about because Jack Horner, a famous paleontologist, decided to tweak a few noses.  His scavenger theory isn't taken terribly seriously and is based more on his own rather narrow view of a dinosaur he doesn't really like than on hard evidence.  T rex more than likely scavenged in the same way lions scavenge off hyena kills.  If there's an easy meal available, why waste your energy hunting something?  I'm familiar with his arguments and find none of them compelling.  I'll just cover three of the main points he makes.

T rex was not fast.  T Rex probably topped out at around 20 miles an hour.  It was not a fast animal, at least not as an adult, but so what?  As a predator, you only need to be fast enough to catch your prey and the animals that T rex would have been eating at the time were not any faster that it was.

T rex's arms were too tiny to catch prey with.  So what?  It didn't use its arms for predation.  That's what its over sized head was for.  Crocodiles don't use their arms to hunt.  Wolves don't use their arms to hunt.  Eagles don't use their arms to hunt and yet they all seem to do a fine job of feeding themselves.

T rex had an amazing sense of smell, like a turkey vulture.  Turkey vultures are scavengers so T rex must have too.  Canines and sharks also have fantastic senses of smell, maybe not on par with the vulture but how does this make keen sense of smell a scavenger thing?  T rex also had sharp, enormous eyes and binocular vision (no, it's sight was not movement based, FU Jurassic Park).  Good eye sight is more valuable to a predator chasing moving prey than to a dedicated scavenger eating things that aren't moving anymore.

There is no reason to think T rex was primarily a scavenger.  That's not to say it absolutely wasn't a scavenger, but no evidence indicates it preferred to eat dead things over killing live things.

Answer 6

Most likely both. There are few animals that are purely hunters or purely scavengers. It makes sense for a predatory animal to scavenge if the opportunity arises - it's getting a meal without having to expend any energy catching it. Look at animals like lions and hyenas - both are skilled hunters, but both will happily eat carrion if they find it, and both will steal the other's kills when they can. Then there are animals like jackals, which are commonly thought of as scavengers. Certainly they will eat the left-overs of kills made by other animals, but they can't rely totally on this for all their food - they also hunt small animals for themselves.