WASHINGTON - Potty humor just got prehistoric. A new study suggests that dinosaurs may have helped keep an already overheated world warmer with their flatulence and burps 200 million years ago.
The research, published Monday in Current Biology, suggests that large dinosaurs made a significant contribution to the greenhouse effect back then.
Study author David Wilkinson of Liverpool John Moores University in England estimated that 570 million tons of methane came from dinosaurs. That's similar to total atmospheric levels of methane today produced by livestock, farming and industry. Cows alone now produce nearly 100 tons a year of methane.
The study looks at the biggest - and presumably gassiest - dinosaurs, called sauropods. These were the long-necked plant-eaters that munched on the top of trees. They were large animals that had food fermenting in their guts for long periods of time because of their giant size, said University of Maryland paleontologist Thomas Holtz, who wasn't part of the study.
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Wilkinson said dinosaur gas was just one factor at a time when the world was quite tropical, about 18 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than now.
A variety of factors caused the ancient pre-human world to be so hot - just the way the dinosaurs needed it. Volcanoes spewed much more greenhouse gases than now, Holtz said. Swamps, water currents, shallow seas and plentiful plankton combined to raise greenhouse-gas levels far higher than today, he said.
Outside climate experts say that the study makes some sense, but that the warming from dinosaur gas back then is dwarfed by man-made carbon dioxide today from industry. NASA climate scientist Gavin Schmidt quickly ran some calculations based on Wilkinson's figures. Dinosaur methane would have hiked temperatures about half a degree Fahrenheit, which is a fraction of what's been caused by the burning of fossil fuels like coal and oil in the 20th century, he said.
