英语听力：2013-07-31 《恐龙的战争》3 顽强防御—20

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Working as a team, the ultimate carnivore delivers a killing² blow. For the T-Rex, it’s a veritable feast. This battle plays out over and over again, sparking evolutionary³ changes in carnivores, which in turn challenges plant eaters. 

 

You can look at it as sort of almost an arms race between the herbivores and the carnivores, and the herbivores protect themselves. The carnivores changed in order to attack and be able to have enough power to kill the herbivores.

 

The arms race between predator⁴ and prey⁵ continues for millions of years. Carnivores develop some of the most effective killing tools seen in Earth’s history. Prehistoric⁶ plant eaters evolved defenses simply unmatched today. 

 

Parasaurolophus, with a call so powerful it’s a dangerous weapon. Sauroposeidon, bigger than any land creature we’ll ever see. Ankylosaurus, with a club for a tail and armor built like a bulletproof vest. And Triceratops, the big bruiser with a skull⁷ strong enough to stop the jaws⁸ of a T-Rex. 

 

All these Cretaceous plant eaters, with their complicated apparatus⁹, they’re all much more sophisticated. So we’re beginning to understand that we woefully underestimated the inner and outer life of the veggiesaur. 

 

Plant-eating dinosaurs¹⁰ became incredibly tough to survive from the Jurassic Period to the Cretaceous more than 165 million years. Even today, the battle between herbivores and carnivores rages on. But it’s this brutal¹¹ war for survival and constant adaptation that has created the incredible natural world that we live in today.

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