Isaberrysaura
Isaberrysaura was a medium-sized plant-eating dinosaur that lived in what is now Argentina during the Middle Jurassic. It looked a bit like a stegosaur but scientists think it was actually a very early ornithopod. Its skeleton still had seeds from its last meal inside its ribcage!13
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Fun facts
Isaberrysaura is the first neornithischian dinosaur ever found from the Jurassic of South America.1
Its fossil was found with a mass of permineralized seeds in the middle-posterior part of the chest cavity, showing it ate cycad seeds.1
Even though Isaberrysaura had a stegosaur-like appearance, scientists think it was a basal ornithopod, not a stegosaur.1
The only known skeleton is an almost complete skull and partial body, found articulated (still connected) in marine-deltaic rocks.1
Isaberrysaura lived about 170 to 168 million years ago, during the Bajocian stage of the Middle Jurassic.3
The fossil was found in the Los Molles Formation, which is a marine-deltaic deposit, and it is the first dinosaur reported from that unit.1
Scientists think Isaberrysaura may have helped spread cycad seeds, acting like a seed-dispersal agent.1
Most asked questions about Isaberrysaura
?How big was Isaberrysaura?
Isaberrysaura was a medium-sized dinosaur, about 5 to 6 metres (16 to 20 feet) long.2
?What did Isaberrysaura eat?
Isaberrysaura ate plants, especially cycad seeds. Its fossilized stomach contents contained a mass of seeds from cycads, and its teeth suggest it might have also eaten other things, but no animal remains were found.12
?Is Isaberrysaura a stegosaur?
Scientists disagree. It was first thought to be a basal ornithopod, but newer studies place it as a neornithischian, not a stegosaur.2
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Myth buster
Myth: Many people think Isaberrysaura was a stegosaur because of its plated appearance.
Truth: Despite looking like a stegosaur, Isaberrysaura is classified as a basal ornithopod, a different group of dinosaurs.1
For dino experts
- Scientific name
- Isaberrysaura
- Named by
- Salgado et al. 20173
- Group
- Plated dinos
- Family / clade
- Huayangosauridae3
- Classification
- Ornithischia > Stegosauria > Thyreophora3
- Age of the rocks
- 171 to 169 million years (Bajocian)3
- Rock formations
- Los Molles3
- Countries
- Argentina3
- Fossil records
- 1 in the Paleobiology Database3
- Discovery
- Isaberrysaura was named in 2017 by Salgado and colleagues. The fossil was collected from the Los Molles Formation in Neuquén Province, Argentina, and named after fossil collector Isabel Berry.13
- Still debated
- Scientists are still debating whether Isaberrysaura was a very early thyreophoran (like a stegosaur) or a basal ornithopod that evolved to look like a stegosaur.1
Where the facts come from
- A new primitive Neornithischian dinosaur from the Jurassic of Patagonia with gut contents | Scientific Reports (nature.com)
- Isaberrysaura (en.wikipedia.org)
- Isaberrysaura in The Paleobiology Database (CC BY 4.0): age, places, rock formations, classification.
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