Zupaysaurus was another early theropod from the Los Colorados Formation of the La Rioja province in Argentina, which is believed to have been an ancient floodplain home to many sauropodomorph dinosaurs. It probably also ate fish.Ĭlassification: Dinosauria, Saurischia, Eusaurischia, Theropoda, Neotheropoda It was a widely distributed animal, with specimens found 50 km apart. It probably foraged in water, or browsed near the ground, and had a weak bite force. Since it was omnivorous, it probably didn’t need a lot of coordination and balance, as reflected in its CAT scan. It had a proportionally small brain compared to other ornithomimosaurs, making it unlikely to have complex social behavior compared to other members of its family, and more like a sauropod in that respect. It had relatively short legs, blunt claws, and a sail along its back, as well as a skull with a wide bill and deep lower jaw, with teeth that indicates that it was a possible omnivore.īy Fraizer on large size probably helped it against the large predators of the time, such as Tarbosaurus, however it also probably was no where near as adept at running as other ornithomimosaurs. Since we only knew it from arms for a long time, it has been placed with the carnosaurs, but soon was placed with the ornithomimosaurs given the similarities. It was fairly bulky but had hollow bones to minimize its weight, and had some of the largest arms of any bipedal dinosaur (tying with Therizinosaurus for the title). It was an ornithomimosaur, and the largest of the group. It was extremely large, about 5 meters high and 11 meters long, and lived in an environment with many huge dinosaurs such as Shantungosaurus, Tarbosaurus, Beishanlong, Therizinosaurus, and Gigantoraptor. In all seriousness, Deinocheirus lived about 71 to 69 million years ago, in the late Campanian to early Maastrichtian ages of the Late Cretaceous,and was found in the Nemegt Formation in Mongolia. But this past year the mystery has been put to rest with the discovery of more fossil material, from two more complete specimens that has mostly revealed that this dinosaur was essentially a huge platypus/camel hybrid. So when I was a kid (honestly, until this past year) all we knew about this dinosaur was that it had really, really long arms. It was a carnivore, and also has helped contribute to the body of evidence that has placed Herrerasaurus, Eoraptor and others firmly in the Theropoda clade, as opposed to an off-shooting group from the major group of predatory dinosaurs, as it has features of Herrerasaurus and Coelophysis, making it an intermediate stepping stone.īy Rebecca Groom on Deinocheirus mirificusĬlassification: Dinosauria, Saurischia, Eusaurischia, Theropoda, Neotheropoda, Averostra, Tetanurae, Orionides, Avetheropoda, Coelurosauria, Tyrannoraptora, Maniraptoriformes, Ornithomimosauria, Deinocheiridae As all Triassic dinosaurs, it lived in an area filled with many different types of archosaurs and reptiles, with dinosaurs only making up a small part of the population.
It is from the same fossil quarry as many basal dinosaurs such as Chindesaurus, but also later complex theropods such as Coelophysis, showing how early dinosaurs radiated out from South America into other areas. It is one of the earliest of the more complex theropods, such as the Coelophysids. It lies outside the main clade of Neotheropoda, which includes the later theropods, however it symbolizes a stepping stone between the basal theropods and the advanced members of the group. Tawa is a more complex theropod from the Norian stage of the Late Triassic, about 215 million years ago, and was found in the Hayden Quarry in Ghost Ranch in New Mexico. Name Meaning: Ruth Hall’s Puebloan sun godĬlassification: Dinosauria, Saurischia, Eusaurischia, Theropoda, Neotheropoda, Coelophysoidea