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Dinosaur Names Beginning with the letter T.

Talarurus

Talarurus

Jack Mayer Wood, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Armoured
Lived: Late Cretaceous, 96 – 89 million years ago
Weight: 2,000kgs
Length 5m / 16ft
Diet: Herbivorous

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Talarurus is pronounced “tal-a-roor-us,” and its genus name is derived from the Greek words “tálaros,” which means “basket or wicker cage”, and “oura,” which means “back or tail” i.e. wicker tail in reference to the wicker tendons that stiffened its tail and helped it become such a lethal weapon. In 1952, Russian paleontologists found and named this dinosaur.

Talarurus lived throughout the Cretaceous period and roamed Asia’s terrestrial areas, including what is now Mongolia, from the Cenomanian period to 83.6 million years ago. Talarurus was one of the breed’s earliest members, dating back about 30 million years before the K/T extinction. Talarurus is an ankylosaurid dinosaur genus. Talarurus is one of Asia’s most well-known ankylosaurs. The only type species for this genus is T. plicatospineus.

Its fossils have been discovered in areas like Dornogovi (Mongolia) and mnögovi (Mongolia). Fossils of these animals have been discovered in the Bayan Shireh formation deposits, which date back millions of years to the Late Cretaceous epoch. The dinosaur’s distribution range appears to have been limited to Asia and several individuals’ skeletons are fairly complete in the fossil record. The discovered specimen includes an incomplete skull, including the occipital region and basicranium, several vertebrae, several ribs, a scapulocoracoid, a humerus, a radius, an ulna, a nearly entire manus, a partial ilium, an ischium, a femur, a tibia, a fibula, a nearly full pes, and various armour and scutes. 

The dinosaur was a large, medium-sized herbivore that grew to be up to 5 meters long. It could also weigh up to 907.2 kg, making it a hundred times larger than a porpoise. It possessed a large cranium, measuring around 24 cm long and 22cm wide.

Talarurus was depicted as a four-legged creature by palaeontologists and despite the fact that the foot was not identified during articulation, one foot is a composite, and three toes is probably a more correct number.

Talarurus wore bone armour and used the club on its tail to protect itself and at the end of the dinosaur, tail was a fused-bone club. Strong Spikes adorned its cheeks and the back of its head and images of Talarurus demonstrate that they were thought to be green or dark brown in appearance. It had a rostrum that was quite large. It had strong, short limbs that supported a broad, rounded bell and it was determined that these were females who laid eggs. 

The Talarurus was a wetland creature, found in arid environments. Talarurus would have been a low-growing vegetation browser in Mongolia’s range. These were quadrupedal herbivores who ate plant materials that grew at low altitudes.

The dinosaur wore bone armor and used the club on its tail to protect itself. The most active means of defense was its tail. Strong muscles at the tail’s base would have allowed it to be spun violently at an assailant. Aggression in Talarurus dinosaurs, on the other hand, is unknown.

Mostly as a result of habitat loss About 90 million years ago, the Talarurus genus went extinct.

Tanius

Tanius

FunkMonk (Michael B. H.), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Ornithopod
Lived: Late Cretaceous, 121 – 99 million years ago
Weight: 2,000kgs
Length 7m / 23ft
Diet: Herbivorous

FURTHER READING AND STUDY

Niclas et al., (2021).  Postcranial osteology of the basally branching hadrosauroid dinosaur Tanius sinensis from the Upper Cretaceous Wangshi Group of Shandong, China

Buffetaut & ‬Tong (1993). Tsintaosaurus spinorhinus Young and Tanius sinensis Wiman: ‬a preliminary comparative study of two hadrosaurs ‬from the Upper Cretaceous of China

 Zhang et al., (2017). Review of historical and current research on the Late Cretaceous dinosaurs and dinosaur eggs from Laiyang, Shandong

The name Tanius is pronounced “tahn-ee-us.” In honour of Chinese palaeontologist Tan Xichou, the name Tanius means “of Tan.” It was described and named in 1929. It inhabited the terrestrial plains of Asia throughout the late Cretaceous period, which lasted from roughly 145 to 66 million years ago. Between the Coniacian and Campanian epochs, the Tanius dinosaur roamed the earth roughly between 72 and 83 million years ago.

Hadrosaurids, or duck-billed dinosaurs, were a form of Tanius. Carl Wiman named T. sinensis as the type species in 1929. Other Tanius species have been reassigned to different genus. Paleontologists discovered the remains in April 1923 in the east of Shandong, ten kilometres southeast of Lai Yang, in the town of Ch’ing-kang-kou. Only sections of the specimen could be preserved, despite the fact that it was formerly quite complete. The holotype was discovered in the Wangshi Formation, which dates back to the Campanian period. It is made up of the flat and extended rear of the skull. Several other fragments would later be attributed to Tanius. One of the preserved vertebrae from its back appears to have a high spine.

It was a herbivorous dinosaur that moved on both two and four legs. It was a flat-headed hadrosauroid dinosaur that fell in between early iguanodonts and advanced hadrosaurs. Tanius was around 7 meters long and weighed 2,000 kilograms. Tanius sinensis was a big, scaly dinosaur with dark skin (most likely dark green, grey, or black), four flat feet with three-pointed toes apiece, and a long, thick tail that ended in a point. It had scaly spines all over its back, and its head was long and flat, and because it was a hadrosaur, its mouth was wide and flat, like a duck bill. Tanius dinosaurs were oviparous, meaning they laid eggs to breed. They were estimated to move at speeds of 30.7-38.2 mph, and they did it by hopping on all fours, running on their two hind legs, or using all four feet.

The dinosaur’s remains were discovered in Shandong Province, China’s coastline region. We can deduce from this that this dinosaur preferred warm, windy regions. Tanius dinosaurs were herbivores by nature, hence they most likely lived off of leaves, twigs, roots, and rudimentary fruits, vegetables, and seeds. Tanius, like most dinosaurs, like to live in groups. This dinosaur possesses a long, thick tail as well as spines on its back, which it must have to utilize to fight other dinosaurs. Due to extreme climatic change, the Tanius dinosaurs all perished off around 66 million years ago.

Tarbosaurus

Tarbosaurus

DaBler, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Large theropod
Lived: Late Cretaceous, 70 million years ago
Weight: 5,000kgs
Length 10 – 12m / 33 – 39ft
Diet: Carnivorous

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“Tar-bow-SORE-us baa-taa” is how Tarbosaurus is pronounced. The common name is “alarming lizard,” which is derived from the Ancient Greek “tarbos,” which means fright or alarm, and “sauros,” which means lizard. In 1955, it was described and given a name. Tarbosaurus was a carnivorous dinosaur. It lived in Asia’s floodplains between 68 and 65 million years ago, during the late Cretaceous period. From 83.6 million years ago to the Maastrichtian Age, it existed.

Tarbosaurus, like other known tyrannosaurids, was a big bipedal predator and theropod. Some palaeontologists once thought it was a Tyrannosaurus species, however evidence reveals Tarbosaurus is too different from Tyrannosaurus. Only one Tarbosaurus species, T. bataar, has been officially recognised. The Mongolian word “baatar” means “hero,” and Tarbosaurus’ name “bataar” is a misspelling of that word.

At least five skulls and postcraniums from roughly 46 Tarbosaurus individuals have been discovered. In 1946, the first Tarbosaurus fossils were discovered in Mongolia’s Nemegt Formation in the Gobi Desert. A fragmentary skull and some vertebrae make up the holotype. So far, 18 Tarbosaurus foot bones and ten Tarbosaurus hand bones have been studied. Despite the fact that the creature was massive, its skeleton was surprisingly light.

The largest known individual was about 12 meters in length and weighed 5.64 tons. Tarbosaurus’ skull was tall and stiff, similar to Tyrannosaurus’, but not as wide, especially at the back. The head was supported by an S-shaped neck, while the rest of the vertebral column, including the lengthy tail, was held horizontally. Of all the dinosaurs, Tarbosaurus has the tiniest forelimbs or arms. Each hand featured two clawed digits, with an additional unclawed third metacarpal on some specimens. In contrast to the forelimbs, the three-toed hindlimbs were long and thick, supporting the body in a bipedal position. The head and body were counterbalanced by the long, weighty tail, which shifted the center of gravity to the hips. Its massive cranium was surprisingly light, with plenty of air space. Because many of its bones were hollow, they were both powerful and light. Its jaw possessed 60 strong teeth and a one-of-a-kind jaw locking mechanism. Tarbosaurus has skin imprints that demonstrate the animal had non-overlapping scales. Tarbosaurus could achieve speeds of up to 25 miles per hour.

Tarbosaurus bataar thrived in a humid floodplain with river channels running through it. It was a top-of-the-food-chain predator in this environment, most likely feeding on other huge dinosaurs. This beast was not only one of the largest known predators in what is now Mongolia, but it was also a scavenger, as its fossilised bite marks on Saurolophus remains testify.

The dinosaur was enormous and dangerous. Normally, this carnivorous dinosaur preyed on much larger dinosaurs. The dinosaur was also a formidable opponent. These characteristics are what allowed the Tarbosaurus to hunt and defeat larger prey. Tarbosaurus was one of the dinosaurs that perished during the Mesozoic Era’s Cretaceous-Tertiary mass extinction. During the Late Cretaceous period, 68-72 million years ago, the Tarbosaurus roamed the world for a less period of time. These are thought to be one of the last dinosaur species to have existed.

Tarchia

Tarchia

Conty, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Armoured
Lived: Late Cretaceous, 75 – 68 million years ago
Weight: 2,500kgs
Length 8m / 18ft
Diet: Herbivorous

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Tarchia is pronounced “tahrk-ee ah,” which means “brainy one.” The generic name is derived from Mongolian tarkhi, which means “brain,” and Latin ia, which refers to the size of the brain. In 1977, it was given a name and a description. The Tarchia inhabited the terrestrial plains of Asia circa 75-70 million years ago, during the upper Cretaceous or late Cretaceous epoch. The dinosaur’s time span was somewhere between the late Campanian and Maastrichtian periods.

The Tarchia was Asia’s newest ankylosaurid, with two subspecies: Tarchia teresae and Tarchia gigantea.  Tarchia tumanovae, a new species to the genus, was formally added in 2021. The Tarchia was the ancestor of Asian Ankylosaurid groups. Tarchia is the largest and most recent anylosaur, with a complete skeleton that includes an armored cranium. In 1971, a skull of an ankylosaurian was unearthed near Khulsan, and a further holotype was discovered in Mongolia’s Nemegt Basin’s Upper Cretaceous Barun Goyot Formation. It consisted of three parts: a roof, a braincase, and the back of the skull. A huge postcranial skeleton with three “free” tail vertebrae, twelve tail vertebrae from the “handle” of the tail club and a scute, a right humerus, and a skeleton with a skull were also discovered. Despite the discovery of two full Tarchia skulls and a complete cranial skeleton, the quantity of bones is still unknown.

A Tarchia was a quadrupedal dinosaur that walked on four legs. Tarchia is one of the largest ankylosaurids ever discovered, measuring over eight metres in length. The Tarchia was between 5.5 and 8.5 meters long and weighed between 1,364 and 1,082 kilograms. Spikes on the back and a powerful skull are among the most common features observed. It also had small legs and a large but bony tail club. They had bulbous bone growths across the tops of their heads. Tarchia had a wide cropping beak across its mouth, which allowed vast amounts of grass to be dragged into the mouth indiscriminately. The teeth demonstrate occlusion wear, which simply means that the upper and lower jaws’ teeth make regular contact. Tarchia also had a hard palate and a snout with a network of air channels that would have moistened the dry air in its environment before it reached its lungs. Tarchia could still breathe while processing food in its mouth due to the existence of the hard palate.

The Tarchia dinosaur, sometimes known as a desert animal, was thought to occupy a wide range of habitats, including open grasslands, well-watered forests, deserts, coastlines, woodlands, wetlands, and regions with abundant vegetation. The diet consisted primarily of leaves, roots, seeds, flowers, and fruits. It is known that it stayed away from its predators and in particular, is believed to have lived in a pair or a group. The Tarchia was noted for using its bony tail club to fight against predators.

Tarchia was assumed to have gone extinct around 70 million years ago, at the end of the Maastricht stage of the late Cretaceous period, due to natural disasters, habitat loss, or predatory factors.

Telmatosaurus

Telmatosaurus

User:Ghedo, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Ornithopod
Lived: Late Cretaceous, 84 – 65 million years ago
Weight: 500kgs
Length 5m / 16.4ft
Diet: Herbivorous

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The name Telmatosaurus means “marsh lizard” and is pronounced, “tel-ma-toh-sore-us.” The generic name was taken from the Greek word “Telma” which means marsh, a reference to hadrosaurs’ rumored swamp-dwelling habits.  It was named in 1903. Telmatosaurus is a maastrichtian hadrosaur from southeast Europe. It lived during the Cretaceous epoch and was found in Europe’s swamps. From 83.5 million years ago to the Maastrichtian Age, it existed. It was one of the dinosaurs that lived on Hateg Island, a late Cretaceous island that would eventually become the Romanian Hateg Basin. 

Telmatosaurus is a herbivorous basal hadrosauromorph dinosaur genus. Limnosaurus transsylvanicus was the initial name for Telmatosaurus. However, it was discovered that the genus name Limnosaurus had previously been used to name a crocodile following this naming.  So the original name comes from the prevalent belief that hadrosaurids like Telmatosaurus foraged sought soft vegetation in wetlands at the time. The only type species for this genus is T. ‬transsylvanicus.

Its fossils have been discovered in Romania, Caraș-Severin, and France’s Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur. The holotype, a cranium with lower jaws, was discovered in the Haţeg Basin in a stratum of the Sânpetru Formation dating from the Maastrichtian, around 68 million years ago. Fragmentary hadrosauroid material from Spain, France, and Germany, previously attributed to Orthomerus, is now commonly attributed to Telmatosaurus, though an identity is difficult to verify; the same is true of several Romanian fragments and eggs.

Telmatosaurus, with a length of five meters and a weight of half a ton, was thought to be an example of insular dwarfism due to its modest size. It walked both bipedally and quadrupedally. The jaw of the juvenile dwarf dinosaur Telmatosaurus transsylvanicus, a species of primitive duck-billed dinosaur, has been discovered with the first-ever record of a tumorous facial growth identified in a fossil. The discovery of this benign tumor in a dinosaur is a first, as ameloblastomas were previously only known to exist in modern mammals (including humans) and reptiles. Although it seems unlikely that the tumor caused the dinosaur any pain during its early stages of development, researchers can infer from its size that it died before reaching adulthood. No one can determine its cause of death because just the two lower jaws have been preserved. It reproduced by laying eggs. 

Like many other dinosaur species, it inhabited the marshy habitats of western Cretaceous Europe. As Zalmoxes ate fallen fruit from the ground, cleansing the ground and feeding, it was a herbivore that stripped freshly evolved flowers of their leaves. It also ate C3 plants, shrubs, herbaceous plants, leaves, and seeds. Due to the threat of the top dinosaur predator Balaur, a flightless bird, Telmatosaurus, like other hadrosaurs, most likely travelled in herds for safety in numbers.’ Crocodiles were likely to prey on them because of their habitat. They are thought to have gone extinct around 70-66 million years ago, based on the remnants of this species.

Tenontosaurus

Tenontosaurus

Nobu Tamura (http://spinops.blogspot.com), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Ornithopod
Lived: Early Cretaceous, 115 – 108 million years ago
Weight: 1,000 – 2,000kgs
Length 6.5 – 8m / 21 – 26ft
Diet: Herbivorous

Tenontosaurus (ten-ONT-oh-SAWR-us) was a large ornithopod (bird-footed) dinosaur that lived in the Aptian – Albian ages during Lower Cretaceous period about 116 – 113 million years ago, in Canada, North America. Tenontosaurus lived in prehistoric swamps and is now considered to be a very primitive iguanodont.

Tenontosaurus measured 26 feet (8 metres) in length, 10 feet (3 metres) in height (in bipedal stance) and weighed around 2 tons. It was large and heavily built and quadrupedal/bipedal but spent most of its time on 4 legs, grazing but could also rear up onto its hind legs to forage in trees. Tenontosaurus had a long, broad tail which was stiffened by a network of bony tendons. Most of the tendons on ornithopod dinosaurs are strong along their backbone and hip regions. Tenontosaurus had a beak similar to other bird-footed dinosaurs.

Tenontosaurus was a herbivore and its diet would have consisted of ferns, cycads, gingkos and primitive flowering plants. Its powerful, U-shaped beak and the angled cutting surfaces of its teeth meant it was not limited to which part of the plant it consumed. Leaves, wood and even fruit may have formed part of its diet.

Thecodontosaurus (socket-toothed lizard) is pronounced “theek-o-don-toh-sore-us.” The genus name is derived from the Greek words “thk” (socket) and “odous” (tooth), referring to the fact that the roots of the teeth were not fused with the jaw bone, as they are in modern lizards, but were instead positioned in distinct tooth sockets. In 1836, Thecodontosaurus became the fifth dinosaur to be named. 

The herbivorous Thecodontosaurus existed from 247.2 million years ago until the Sinemurian Age and occupied the terrestrial areas of Europe during the Triassic period. This was around the time when dinosaurs and mammals were first appearing. Thecodontosaurus is a herbivorous basal sauropodomorph dinosaur genus that is extinct. Apart from the initial type species, Thecodontosaurus antiquus, the genus would gain seventeen more species. The specific epithet, “antiquus”, means “ancient” in Latin. 

Thecodontosaurus fossils have been discovered in England (near Bristol), Wales, Bavaria, England, and Matabeleland North, all of which were likely dry and desert-like environments when the dinosaur existed. Its remains are known mostly from Triassic “fissure fillings” in South England. At present in total about 245 fragmentary specimens are known, representing numerous individuals. The original type specimen, of Thecodontosaurus a lower jaw, was heavily bombed by the Germans during World War II. Although the original material used to describe Thecodontosaurus has been lost, there are several more examples that have been discovered.

Thecodontosaurus was a small dinosaur with powerful back legs and smaller front legs, about 2.5 metres in length (around the size of a medium-sized dog like a Labrador with a long tail). It walked on all fours but reached up into the trees with its front legs, grabbing the stems of prehistoric trees known as cycads with its claws. Its little sharp teeth, each with a row of tiny sharp ridges running down one side, acted like blades, ripping through thick, succulent leaves. Thecodontosaurus had a short neck that supported a big head with enormous eyes. The hands and feet of this dinosaur had five digits apiece, and the hands were long and thin with an extended claw on each. The front limbs of this dinosaur were shorter than the legs, and its tail was longer than the head, neck, and body combined. It was 1.2 metres long, 30 centimetres tall, and weighed 11 kilos on average. The diminutive size has been attributed to insular dwarfism. 

It was a prehistoric dinosaur that lived in the late Triassic period, when the Earth was still quite warm and much of the area was arid and desert-like. Thecodontosaurus’ leaf-shaped teeth indicate a more purely herbivorous diet. Thecodontosaurus was most likely a social animal, as evidenced by the fact that it was found in large numbers in congested areas. As a result, tiny groups of these dinosaurs would have wandered the shoreline and caves. They’d have had to be at least a little wary, as they’d only have their own speed to get away from predators.

Therizinosaurus

Therizinosaurus_cheloniformis

DataBase Center for Life Science (DBCLS), CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Large theropod
Lived: Late Cretaceous, 70 million years ago
Weight: 3,000kgs 
Length 9 – 10m / 33 – 33ft
Diet: Herbivorous

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Therizinosaurus is pronounced, “THER-ih-zine-oh-SORE-us,” which means scythe lizard. The genus name is derived from the Greek words “therzo” (scythe, reap, or cut) and “sauros” (lizard) in allusion to the large manual unguals. It was given its name in 1954 because of its huge claws.  Therizinosaurus lived in Asia during the Late Cretaceous epoch in what is now the Nemegt Formation. The vertebrate fossil assemblage discovered in the Gobi desert implies it existed between 70 million and 68 million years ago, during the early Maastrichtian era.

Therizinosaurus is a genus of herbivorous dinosaurs belonging to the therizinosaurid family. T. cheloniformis is the only recognized species of this genus at the moment. The word cheloniformis comes from the Greek “chelóni,” which means turtle, and the Latin “formis,” which refers to the remains of a turtle-like animal. For this novel and intriguing taxon, scientists created a new family: Therizinosauridae.

Therizinosaurus was one of the last and most massive members of its genus. The first fossils now attributed to Therizinosaurus were discovered in Mongolia in the late 1940s, and include several giant claws measuring up to a meter in length. However, until the early 1950s, when more fossil expeditions unearthed more bones, several more sets of claws, and parts of a forelimb and hindlimb, it was unknown to what creature these belonged. Following discoveries in northern China, paleontologists were able to piece together the animal’s general skeletal structure, revealing that it was a dinosaur rather than a turtle. Near the Xixia Basin in Nanyang, China, dinosaur researchers uncovered two 18-inch-long fossilized eggs. These are maybe the largest eggs ever discovered by any mammal. An investigation of one of these eggs in 1995 showed the bones of a tiny theropod that could have belonged to a therizinosaur. 

This dinosaur had the weirdest appearance of all dinosaurs, with broad hips and a pot belly. An adult Therizinosaurus weighed around 6 tons and grew to be 9–10 meters long and 4–5 meters tall. Therizinosaurus had a long neck and a tiny head with a beaked mouth. It was bipedal and had a big, heavy, deep body, as demonstrated by the wide pelvis, 2.5 meters long ‘arms,’ and hind legs with four toes (three of which supported the animal’s weight) and small, curled claws at the tips, and the presence of three enormous claws on the animal’s front limbs was its most distinguishing trait. These claws grew to roughly a meter in length on each of its ‘hands’ three digits. The first digit had the largest claw. We don’t have any concrete proof that Therizinosaurus possessed feathers, but given its lifestyle and place in the theropod family tree, it was likely covered in feathers at some point during its life. They had a body plan that is similar to that of the modern gorillas, and because its arms were long enough to touch the ground in some positions, they may have assisted the dinosaur in rising from a prone position. Therizinosaurus may have been able to reach even higher vegetation when browsing in a bipedal stance, thanks to its short and powerful feet. 

As Therizinosaurus remnants have been discovered in fluvial strata, it is thought that it preferred to feed in riparian habitats. Therizinosaurus’ feeding habits are unknown, however, it was most likely a herbivore that used its large claws to push leaves into its mouth. Therizinosaurus could sit while eating the leaves of big bushes and trees. The plant material would have been picked with its hands, and its lengthened neck would have aided this process by preventing the application of excessive force and effort.

Herizinosaurus may have migrated in herds as well.  Therizinosaurus’ claws could have served a variety of purposes, including defense against predators and intraspecific warfare (such as fighting for territory) or mating. 

Thescelosaurus

Thescelosaurus

Leandra Walters, Phil Senter, James H. Robins, CC BY 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Ornithopod
Lived: Late Cretaceous, 66 million years ago
Weight: 200 – 300kgs / 450 – 660Ibs
Length 2.5 – 4m / 8.2 – 13.1ft
Diet: Herbivorous

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Thescelosaurus is pronounced “thes-kel-oh-SORE-us” and translates to “wonderful lizard.” The name of the species stems from the ancient Greek words “theskelos” and “sauros,” which mean “godlike, wondrous” and “lizard,” respectively. It was given its name in 1913. It inhabited North America throughout the Cretaceous epoch and existed from 83.5 million years ago until the Maastrichtian Age. Many of its specimens are preserved and intact, indicating that it may have loved to live near waterways.

Thescelosaurus was a genus of tiny herbivorous neornithischian dinosaurs. Thescelosaurus neglectus is a type species and T. assiniboiensis and T. garbanii are two species in this genus. This dinosaur genus is a specialized basal ornithopod that was previously classified as a hypsilophodont but is now recognized as different from Hypsilophodon.

The Thescelosaurus was discovered in Wyoming in 1891 and several fragments have been uncovered over the years, but they have received little attention. In 1926, another well-preserved skeleton was discovered in Alberta, Canada, in the Horseshoe Canyon Formation. When a specimen found in 1993 in South Dakota, United States, was interpreted as containing a fossilized heart. Paleontologists have discovered 49 different specimens so far including a foot, tarsus, shin bones, fossilized thigh bone, along with five cervical (neck) and eleven dorsal (back) vertebrae.

Thescelosaurus was a bipedal herbivore with a thickly developed body. A conspicuous ridge ran the length of both maxillae and a ridge running the length of both dentaries. The deep internal to the outside surface of the skull ridges and position of the teeth is considered evidence of muscular cheeks. The cranium contained teeth in the premaxilla, or top beak, in addition to the long narrow beak. Long rod-like bones protruded from the animal’s eyes, giving it thick bony brows. Small pointed premaxillary teeth and leaf-shaped cheek teeth were found. Thescelosaurs had short, broad five-finger hands, four-toed feet with hoof-like toe tips, and a long tail braced by ossified tendons from the middle to the tip, reducing the tail’s flexibility. Thescelosaurus neglectus was a two-legged upright runner who balanced itself with its long tail. Given its relatively long arms and large hands, the animals may have been able to walk on all fours. The animal’s length is believed to be 2.5–4.0 meters, and its weight is 200–300 kg. Thescelosaurus was probably slower because of its heavier build and leg structure. It was possible that it was sexually dimorphic, with one sex being larger than the other. Juvenile remains have been discovered in a number of locations, the majority of which are based on teeth. Some scientists have proposed that Thescelosaurus provides an evolutionary link between crocodilians and birds

Thescelosaurus may have lived near rivers, streams, and other bodies of water. It thrived in a floodplain habitat with a dry subtropical climate that supported a diverse range of flora including angiosperm trees, bald cypress, ferns, and Ginkgos. The teeth and jaws show that the animal was largely herbivorous. Thescelosaurus would have preferentially browsed in the first meter or so from the ground, holding food in its mouth with cheeks while chewing. It was a member of the final dinosaurian fauna to go extinct, roughly 66 million years ago, during the Cretaceous–Palaeogene extinction event.

Torosaurus

Torosaurus

Nobu Tamura (http://spinops.blogspot.com), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Ornithopod
Lived: Late Cretaceous, 68 – 66 million years ago
Weight: 4,000 – 6,000kgs 
Length 8 – 9m / 26 – 30ft
Diet: Herbivorous

Torosaurus (TOR-oh-SAWR-us) was a ‘bird-hipped’ dinosaur from the group known as the horn-faced dinosaurs or ceratopians that lived during the Late Cretaceous period, around 70 – 65 million years ago in what is now Colorado, USA, North America. The type species is T. tanneri.

Torosaurus measured 26 – 30 feet (8 – 9 metres) in length, 7 feet (2 metres) tall at the hips and weighed around 5 tons. Torosaurus possessed one of the largest skulls of any known land animal. Its enormous horned skull was 8 feet long. Torosaurus had a large, bony neck crest, a short horn on the snout, 2 long eyebrow horns and a toothless beak. The horns were possibly also used in courtship rivalry. The presence of 2 large holes in the crest led palaeontologists to believe that it was used for attracting mates and to intimidate opponents. The holes would have been covered by stretched skin creating vivid eye-spots when flushed with blood. These holes were probably filled with muscle. This would have made the massive frill lighter, but also less useful as a protection against enemies. Torosaurus was a quadrupedal dinosaur and moved around on its 4 thick, strong legs.

Torvosaurus

Torvosaurus

Fred Wierum, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Type: Large theropod
Lived: Late Jurassic, 165 – 148 million years ago
Weight: 3,600 – 4,500kgs 
Length10 10m / 33ft
Diet: Carnivorous