# How loud is the roar of a dinosaur? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 8, 2015, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533 "2015-07-08T00:27:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 12:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/21 "2015-07-09T12:14:40Z")
> [@Terminus\_Est](#): > > How load IS the roar of a dinosaur? > > What alternate universe do you come from, OP? Oh just relax on the the ciritcism/hating… Its a good question… and people would be hanging out for an answer. Some academics think that the hadrosaur head decoration could make an enormous sound, with which it could scare off larger dinosaur predators… The lack of any bone structure in larger dinosaurs suggest that they didn’t make extremely loud noises… rather up to about an elephant or lion roar… but not enormous despite their size… that is, hadrosaur proves that the larger dinosaur didn’t make really loud noises, or else the hadrosaur’s whistle would be useless… It exists for a reason…its speculative that it made a loud noise and that scared off the small brained predatory dinosaur, which didn’t have much ability to learn… ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/22 "2015-07-09T12:24:49Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > By any reasonable cladistic reckoning wild turkeys (lowercase) and all other birds ARE dinosaurs ([xkcd: Birds and Dinosaurs](http://xkcd.com/1211/)). So the OP’s question makes sense at least that far, uppercase Wild Turkey notwithstanding. By any strict cladistic reasoning, we’re all bony fishes - dinosaurs, birds, cats, dogs, humans, snakes, frogs and lizards. > [@Isilder](#): > > Oh just relax on the the ciritcism/hating… Chill out yourself. Last time I checked, good-natured snark was still the order of the day on the SDMB. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/23 "2015-07-09T13:33:47Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Back around 1930, when Merian C, Cooper was making _King Kong_, he wrote to the experts at the American Museum of Natural History, asking them this very question. As Goldner and Turner relate, in _The Makig of King Kong_, he got back a long letter that translated to “they probably didn’t have any vocfal cords, and probably didn’t make any sound.” They ended up making the T. rex in Kong doing a sort of hissing sound, not a roar. In 1930, the general assumption of dinosaurs is that they were cold-blooded reptiles. Reptiles as a group are not known for being the loudest creatures, and the most common sound associated with them is hissing. It’s now generally accepted that dinosaurs were quite different from reptiles, and therapods are of course the direct ancestors of birds, a type of animal rather well known for making lots of different sounds. While no bird really “roars,” if you made one twenty feet tall and weighing ten tons I bet they could start roaring. Indeed, given the range of sizes and the incredible variety of types they came in, it seems virtually certain that you could find a dinosaur to make almost any animal noise - roaring, hissing, hooting, barking, trumpeting, and some probably even sang like birds do. Dinosaurs were around from almost as long as mammals have been around, and like mammals came in an astounding number of types. If you consider the remarkable range of sounds mammals can make, that’s probably the number dinosaurs could make. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/24 "2015-07-09T13:40:03Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > In 1930, the general assumption of dinosaurs is that they were cold-blooded reptiles. Reptiles as a group are not known for being the loudest creatures, and the most common sound associated with them is hissing. > > It’s now generally accepted that dinosaurs were quite different from reptiles, and therapods are of course the direct ancestors of birds, a type of animal rather well known for making lots of different sounds. While no bird really “roars,” if you made one twenty feet tall and weighing ten tons I bet they could start roaring. > > Indeed, given the range of sizes and the incredible variety of types they came in, it seems virtually certain that you could find a dinosaur to make almost any animal noise - roaring, hissing, hooting, barking, trumpeting, and some probably even sang like birds do. Dinosaurs were around from almost as long as mammals have been around, and like mammals came in an astounding number of types. If you consider the remarkable range of sounds mammals can make, that’s probably the number dinosaurs could make. It’;s true that the belief was that dinosaurs were big lizards, but that doesn’t change the professor’s assessment, which was based on studies of the skeleton. As the article I linked to points out, > [@](#): > > According to Senter, crocodylians vocalize by using their larynx, a soft-tissue structure in the throat that does not fossilize. Since all the different types of living crocodylians (alligators, crocodiles, and gharials) vocalize this way, it is probable that their common ancestor that lived during the Late Cretaceous did too, but whether their even earlier relatives could do so is unknown. > > Birds, on the other hand, vocalize through an organ in their throat called the syrinx. This is a different organ from the larynx of crocodylians, and thus Senter argues that vocalization in the two groups evolved independently. This would mean that the last common ancestor of birds and crocodylians (which would also be an ancestor of dinosaurs and pterosaurs) might not have been able to vocalize at all. > Read more: [http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/did-dinosaurs-roar-48438337/#d7fCg3IgWrzkr3xa.99](http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/did-dinosaurs-roar-48438337/#d7fCg3IgWrzkr3xa.99) ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/25 "2015-07-09T15:37:28Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > It’;s true that the belief was that dinosaurs were big lizards, but that doesn’t change the professor’s assessment, which was based on studies of the skeleton. As the article I linked to points out, While it’s _possible_ that dinosaurs weren’t able to vocalize, the fact that both crocodilians and birds (modern dinosaurs) are highly vocal (even if they use different mechanisms) suggests that dinosaurs were too. In fact, I think it would be very surprising if they were not. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/26 "2015-07-09T16:03:17Z")
I suspect they made noise, as well. But it ain’t proven. In any event, nobody’s made a movie with noiseless dinosaurs, although the original Kong gave us a squabbling, hissing T. rex. And the stegosaurus had a weird roar. ---
**Author:** ![Duckster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/duckster/32/1244_2.png) [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/27 "2015-07-09T16:13:21Z")
Are we talking Dolby loud or Dolby Atmos loud? ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/28 "2015-07-09T18:27:15Z")
Can a giant chicken roar? ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/29 "2015-07-09T19:29:37Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > (I’m not sure what distinction you are making between roaring and bellowing. They’re pretty much synonymous.) I know it when I hear it? To me a bellow, like the alligator clip, is more of a deep reverberation or a growl, whereas a roar is more like a shout or a loud yell. When the croc is poked with a stick it sounds more like a loud hiss than a roar. I’d associate roars with big cats, bears, gorillas, \* maybe\* [walruses](https://youtu.be/OAVL61yeCYs) (a lot of walrus noises were used in Jurassic Park). But if you want to say crocs can roar, sure. > [@](#): > > Some birds also roar None of those were even close to a roar IMO. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/30 "2015-07-09T19:37:37Z")
It would be pretty damn dissapointing if the last thing our time travelling hero heard before being messily devoured was a mighty “cock-a-doodle-do”. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/31 "2015-07-09T21:14:53Z")
> [@marshmallow](#): > > I know it when I hear it? It’s a highly technical distinction, then.😉 > [@](#): > > None of those were even close to a roar IMO. You’ve obviously never heard a Great Potoo calling in the middle of the night in a deep dark jungle. (Seriously, I’ve known people who were unfamiliar with the call to run back to camp thinking a jaguar was after them.) ---
**Author:** ![Moriarty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moriarty/32/49_2.png) [@Moriarty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moriarty)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/32 "2015-07-09T21:41:17Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > Can a giant chicken roar? No. Which is why dinosaurs didn’t roar. They clucked. ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/33 "2015-07-10T00:54:22Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > I’m sure a T-Rex must be at least 1000 times larger than a modern macaw. [If the call if the T-Rex is 1000 times louder than a macaw, it must be truly earth-shattering.](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/film-news/8376952/Quentin-Tarantino-sues-over-neighbours-macaws-driving-him-to-distraction.html) I once encountered a tame blue-and-gold macaw at a resort (he was the staff pet and star of the lobby). He was carried around and placed on playstands much of the day, but sometimes caged. I approached his cage in the lobby one day and he indicated he wanted out. Obviously I wasn’t authorized to take him out, so I didn’t. He got agitated. He then made a noise – well, a NOISE – that started out as a scream, rising through the decibels until it was no longer tonal, just vibration in my eardrums. Louder and louder. I turned around to see if the staff was running over, and saw that outside the building, _cars on the street were stopping to look_ – cars with their windows rolled up and air-conditioners blasting. It was an _amazing_ noise and I have no doubt that even larger maniraptoran dinosaurs could make sounds equivalent or louder. There’s one on my shoulder right now but he only weighs 93 grams and whistles. ~:\> ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/34 "2015-07-10T01:11:32Z")
> [@moriarty](#): > > no. Which is why dinosaurs didn’t roar. They clucked. VERY, VERY LOUDLY. x ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/35 "2015-07-10T01:18:09Z")
Fine, I’ll say it: They probably tasted like chicken. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/36 "2015-07-10T01:33:47Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Sure. [Alligators roar.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3rzkrm98J0) So do [crocs.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7aOBcD3M70) (I’m not sure what distinction you are making between roaring and bellowing. They’re pretty much synonymous.) > > Some birds also roar, notably the [Great Potoo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbvgIvxEIrg). So does the[cassowary.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dcQO6Zb8Eg) [Ostriches](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kYiJAwVbEs), [emus](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUrCz4t5UlY), and [Kakapo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dsasOfFUcA) parrots all boom. > > There is no reason to think that dinosaurs didn’t roar. They also probably made more diverse sounds, like those of birds. There were some recent discoveries seeming to show [a remarkable similarity](http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/dinosaur-blood-cells-proteins-found-in-crummy-alberta-fossils-1.3106247) between fossilized dinosaur blood cells and those of emus. So I was interested in hearing the emu, and it was disappointing how birdlike it sounded despite its (relatively) huge size. But then I clicked on the cassowary link, and wow! That thing really does roar, and even makes almost-subsonic rumbles. All the more impressive when one realizes that although the cassowary is normally very shy, they can be aggressive and very dangerous when provoked; they have been known to kill people, and interestingly they possess a deadly claw on the middle toe that is similar to the famous velociraptor claw featured in _Jurassic Park_. So I think the conclusion is that dinosaur-like creatures and their descendants had a very wide variety of species-dependent vocalizations so that different dinosaurs probably sounded very different from each other. But I recommend listening to that cassowary link with the subwoofer turned up – especially the part between about 0:08 and 0:11 which sounds straight out of _Jurassic Park_! It might be fun to put it through an audio processor and drastically reduce the frequency while pumping up the volume! ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/37 "2015-07-10T07:39:34Z")
The question in the OP was 'how loud _is_ the roar of a dinosaur? This has two answers. If birds count as dinosaurs, then any present day bird that makes a roaring sound would count - perhaps that parrot in Sailboat’s anecdote. If birds _don’t_ count as dinosaurs, then the sound of a dinosaur’s roar would be very quiet indeed. Presumably the last dinosaur’s roar occurred some time around 65 million years ago; about the same time as the Chixculub impact. The sound of that impact went round the world many times; even Krakatoa, a much smaller sound, went round at least 5 times. After 65 million years the sound of the impact will have gone round the world about 17 billion times- travelling about 70 light years in the process. The sound of the Chixculub impact, if it were audible, would sound as if it came from 70 light years away - and the last dinosaur roar, which happened at about the same time, would have travelled a similar distance. That means that the roar of a dinosaur is a very, very quiet sound indeed. ---
**Author:** ![Ionizer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/5daacb/32.png) [@Ionizer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ionizer)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/38 "2015-07-10T17:17:50Z")
> [@eburacum45](#): > > The question in the OP was 'how loud _is_ the roar of a dinosaur? This has two answers. If birds count as dinosaurs, then any present day bird that makes a roaring sound would count - perhaps that parrot in Sailboat’s anecdote. > > // Snipped. I had an Umbrella 'Too for a few years, and if/when he wanted attention, he could literally be easily heard over a mile+ away, clearly, IME, when he was outdoors. Oftentimes, he could sustain the loudness for 5-10 seconds at a time, repeatedly for a minute or two. Even when he was indoors and I was out walking the dog, I often heard him screaming/‘roaring’ over 6-7 blocks away! They can put out decibels [similar to a jet’s engine. ~135 db, or about 120db average per San Diego Zoo.](http://www.mytoos.com/noise.shtml) I know that ‘cite’ is of a Moluccan 'too, but Umbrella 'toos are very similar, and on a few forums I used for my ‘Too’s care, it was said that the Umbrella has been measured, on average’, comparably loud as a Moluccan 'too. No cite, just memory of what the long-timers spoke of is all. Not the best of sources, no doubt, but until you’ve heard what a largish parrot can do vocally, it is easy to not comprehend the decibel levels of these birds. I was at an animal refuge about a month ago, and several of their Macaws/Amazons went into screaming-mode, and they were not as loud as the Cockatoos I have been around. Just saying. Perhaps those birds were limiting their loudness (?), but a Cockatoo is tremendously loud when it chooses to be so. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/39 "2015-07-10T19:54:17Z")
> [@eburacum45](#): > > If birds _don’t_ count as dinosaurs, then the sound of a dinosaur’s roar would be very quiet indeed. Presumably the last dinosaur’s roar occurred some time around 65 million years ago; about the same time as the Chixculub impact. Modern-day zoos are conservatories of species that might otherwise be extinct; so there must be some living dinosaurs languishing in some zoos somewhere. Ken Ham probably has some. As for macaws vs. cockatoos: Have you ever heard how loud a little green tree frog can be? ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533/40 "2015-07-10T20:00:10Z")
> [@Isilder](#): > > Oh just relax on the the ciritcism/hating. Terminus wasn’t hating, he was just poking light fun at the fact that the OP asked his question about dinosaurs in the present tense rather than the past tense. “How loud is the roar of a dinosaur” instead of “how loud was the roar of a dinosaur” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-loud-is-the-roar-of-a-dinosaur/724533.md?page=1)