Dino card No. 1588 of 2,015

Saurornitholestes

Say it: saw-OR-nith-oh-LES-teez

Name means: “lizard-bird thief”1

Ate: MeatRaptorsLate Cretaceous

Saurornitholestes was a small, fast, meat-eating dinosaur that lived in North America and maybe Europe. It had a big sickle claw on each foot and sharp teeth for catching prey.1

Lived

84 to 66 million years ago2

Late Cretaceous

Fossils found in

Alberta and Saskatchewan, Canada; Montana, New Mexico, Alabama, South Carolina, and other US states; also possible fossils in France, Romania, and Russia1 2

Food

Meat1

Length

1.3 to 1.8 m1

Weight

5 kg to 22.5 kg1

Height

0.6 m1

at the hips

Artist's life restoration of Saurornitholestes — How Saurornitholestes may have looked, by ABelov2014. CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Scientists still argue about colours and details.

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

How big was it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

A tooth from Saurornitholestes was found stuck in the wing bone of a giant pterosaur, maybe a Quetzalcoatlus.1

Saurornitholestes was more lightly built and longer-legged than Velociraptor.1

It lived during the Late Cretaceous, from about 83.6 to 66 million years ago.2

Saurornitholestes used a 'puncture and pull' feeding method, like other meat-eating dinosaurs.1

It is the most common small theropod found in Dinosaur Provincial Park in Alberta, Canada.1

For dino experts

Scientific name: Saurornitholestes
Named by: Sues 19782
Group: Raptors
Family / clade: Dromaeosauridae2
Classification: Theropoda > Dromaeosauridae2
Age of the rocks: 84 to 66 million years (Campanian to Maastrichtian)2
Rock formations: Dinosaur Park, Oldman, Aguja2
Countries: Canada, USA, Romania, Russia, France2
Fossil records: 148 in the Paleobiology Database2
Discovery: In 1974, amateur paleontologist Irene Vanderloh found a skeleton near Steveville, Alberta. Hans-Dieter Sues named it Saurornitholestes langstoni in 1978.1
Still debated: Scientists are not sure if Saurornitholestes is more closely related to Velociraptor or to other dromaeosaurids.1

Where the facts come from

Saurornitholestes (en.wikipedia.org)
Saurornitholestes 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.