Dino card No. 0029 of 2,027

Aegirosaurus

Say it: ay-JEE-roh-SORE-us

Name means: “Aegir's lizard, named after Aegir, the Teutonic god of the ocean”1

Ate: MeatIchthyosaursLate Jurassic to Early CretaceousNot technically a dinosaur

Aegirosaurus was a sleek, dolphin-like marine reptile that swam in the warm seas of Europe during the time of the dinosaurs. It had a long, slender snout packed with tiny, sharp teeth for catching fish and squid.1

Fun fact: this sea reptile swam while dinosaurs walked on land. Everyone calls them dinos, but they were a different branch of reptiles.

Lived

149 to 133 million years ago3

Late Jurassic to Early Cretaceous

Fossils found in

Bavaria, Germany (Solnhofen limestone) and southeastern France (Drôme department)1 3

Food

Meat1 3

Length

1.77 to 2 m1

The neotype specimen is 1.77 m long; the destroyed holotype was about 2 m long

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

How big was it?

How long was it?

as long as 4 house cats nose to tailas long as 11 bananas end to end

How big was Aegirosaurus compared to YOU?

Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.

cool stuff

Fun facts

Aegirosaurus had a very long snout that made up 62 to 73 percent of its lower jaw length.1

Its front flippers were narrow and elongated, but its hind flippers were wide because of extra soft tissue.1

Aegirosaurus had a crescent-shaped tail fin, like a fish, to help it swim fast.1

Fossils of Aegirosaurus show skin impressions, including what might be tiny scales on the upper part of its tail fin.1

This ichthyosaur lived from the Late Jurassic to the Early Cretaceous, about 149 to 133 million years ago.3

Aegirosaurus is one of the few ichthyosaurs known from the Valanginian stage of the Early Cretaceous.1

AI-made picture of Aegirosaurus — An AI-made picture of how Aegirosaurus might have looked, made by a computer from what scientists know. It is a guess: the real animal may have looked different, and nobody knows its true colours.

you asked

Most asked questions about Aegirosaurus

?How big was Aegirosaurus?

Aegirosaurus was a medium sized ichthyosaur. The largest known specimen was about 2 metres (6.6 ft) long, and a complete skeleton is 1.77 metres (5.8 ft) long.1

?What did Aegirosaurus eat?

Aegirosaurus ate small fish and squid. Its long, slender snout was packed with tiny, sharp teeth, and its tooth wear suggests it was a generalist feeder.1

?When did Aegirosaurus live?

Aegirosaurus lived from the Late Jurassic to the Early Cretaceous, about 149 to 133 million years ago.1

?Where was Aegirosaurus found?

Fossils of Aegirosaurus have been found in Germany and France. Its remains were discovered in the Solnhofen limestone of Bavaria, Germany, and in southeastern France.1

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Myth buster

Myth: Aegirosaurus was a dinosaur.

Truth: Aegirosaurus was an ichthyosaur, a marine reptile that lived in the sea, not a dinosaur. Dinosaurs lived on land.1

For dino experts

Scientific name: Aegirosaurus
Named by: Bardet and Fernandez 20003
Group: Ichthyosaurs
Family / clade: Ophthalmosauridae3
Classification: Ichthyosauria > Ichthyosauromorpha3
Age of the rocks: 149 to 133 million years (Tithonian / Valanginian)3
Rock formations: Solnhofen3
Countries: Germany, France3
Fossil records: 3 in the Paleobiology Database3
Discovery: The first fossil was named Ichthyosaurus leptospondylus by Wagner in 1853. In 2000, scientists Bardet and Fernández gave it the new genus name Aegirosaurus after studying a nearly complete skeleton with soft tissue impressions.1 2
Still debated: Scientists are not sure whether Aegirosaurus had scales on its tail fin, because only one fossil shows possible scale impressions.1

Where the facts come from

Aegirosaurus (en.wikipedia.org)
A new ichthyosaur from the Upper Jurassic lithographic limestones of Bavaria | Journal of Paleontology | Cambridge Core (cambridge.org)
Aegirosaurus in The Paleobiology Database (CC BY 4.0): age, places, rock formations, classification.

Every fact on this page has a number that points to its source. If we got something wrong, sorry, we are dino fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.

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