Dino card No. 0155 of 2,015

Archaeornithomimus

Say it: AR-kee-oh-NITH-oh-MIME-us

Name means: “ancient bird mimic”1 2

Ate: A bit of everythingOstrich dinosLate Cretaceous

Archaeornithomimus was a fast, ostrich-like dinosaur that lived in Asia during the Late Cretaceous. It had a beak, long legs, and probably feathers. It could run quickly to escape predators or chase small prey.1

Lived

90 to 72 million years ago4

Late Cretaceous

Fossils found in

Inner Mongolia, China, and Kazakhstan1 2 3

Food

A bit of everything1 3

Length

3.4 m1

Weight

71.5 kg1

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

How big was it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

Its neck bones had air spaces inside, like modern birds, which made its neck lighter.1

Scientists think it had feathers that looked like those of an ostrich.1

It lived alongside the giant dinosaur Gigantoraptor and the predator Alectrosaurus.1

No stress fractures were found in its foot bones, meaning it probably didn't run too hard or too often.1

Its third toe bone was not pinched at the top, so its foot was not built for extreme speed like some other ornithomimids.1

The first fossils were found by an expedition led by Roy Chapman Andrews in 1923.1

AI-made picture of Archaeornithomimus — An AI-made picture of how Archaeornithomimus 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.

For dino experts

Scientific name: Archaeornithomimus
Named by: Russell 19724
Group: Ostrich dinos
Family / clade: Ornithomimidae4
Classification: Theropoda > Ornithomimosauria4
Age of the rocks: 90 to 72 million years (Coniacian to Campanian)4
Rock formations: Iren Dabasu, Dabrazhin4
Countries: China, Kazakhstan4
Fossil records: 3 in the Paleobiology Database4
Discovery: The first fossils were found in 1923 in Inner Mongolia by an American Museum of Natural History expedition. In 1933, Charles Gilmore named them Ornithomimus asiaticus. In 1972, Dale Russell gave them their own genus, Archaeornithomimus.1
Still debated: Scientists are not sure whether Archaeornithomimus was a true ornithomimid or a more primitive ornithomimosaur. Some studies place it inside the family, others outside.1

Where the facts come from

Archaeornithomimus (en.wikipedia.org)
Archaeornithomimus | Natural History Museum (nhm.ac.uk)
PBDB Taxon (paleobiodb.org)
Archaeornithomimus 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.