英语听力：2013-05-26 完美捕食 Perfect Predators —11

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It’s a strategy still used today. Working together, lions will take on prey¹ as big as a four-ton elephant, and they only have teeth and claws. Deinonychus employs an array of weaponry more powerful than any creature today. Sauroposeidon’s only defense² is its massive size, but Deinonychus have learned that nearly any defense can be breached³ with the right armaments, like recurved hand claws almost 8 centimeters long designed to grip into the bodies of prey like a mountain climber’s spikes⁴.

 

The ideal attack is to jump up, grab ahold of the prey, position the prey, and then strike. So the arms are to position your body to deliver that killing⁵ blow. 

 

It could strike very quickly, and it could, if it was attacking a larger animal, use those arms to pull itself up against it. By doing so, it could bring its other main weapon into attack, and that’s its foot claws. 

 

The name Deinonychus means “terrible claw”. It’s a reference to the hinged bone on its foot. The cutting edge is sheathed⁶ in keratin, the same substance that forms a cat’s claw. But on a Deinonychus, this claw is 10 centimeters long. This lethal⁷ weapon is sharpened to a point and can flex⁸ almost 180 degrees. To keep the knife razor-sharp, Deinonychus holds it up off the ground until the moment it’s needed. Then, in one lightning-fast swipe, this sickle⁹ can rip deep into flesh, delivering a kicking blow with 200 kilos of cutting force. 

 

The key to the Deinonychus’ killing blow is the hind¹⁰ leg. The hind leg is the strongest organ in the body by far and ends in a huge claw like a box-cutting knife. So that cutting, curved knife into your belly¹¹, into the target would cause a fatal wound.

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