Shanyangosaurus

Say it: shan-YANG-oh-SORE-us

Name means: “Shanyang lizard”1

Ate: MeatMeat-eating dinosLate Cretaceous

Shanyangosaurus was a meat-eating dinosaur that lived in what is now China during the Late Cretaceous. It is known from only a few bones, so scientists are still learning about it.1

Lived

72 to 66 million years ago5

Late Cretaceous

Fossils found in

Shaanxi, China1

Food

Meat2

Length

1.7 to 2.6 m3

estimate based on comparison with Velociraptor and Oviraptor

Weight

20 kg4

largest known specimen

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

How big was it?

How long was it?

How heavy was it?

as heavy as 5 house cats

as long as 2.5 dogs nose to tailas long as 14 bananas end to endas heavy as 4 watermelons

How big was Shanyangosaurus compared to YOU?

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cool stuff

Fun facts

Shanyangosaurus is known only from a partial sacrum, partial scapula, humeri, femur, tibia, metatarsals, and phalanges.1

Its bones are hollow, which is a feature of coelurosaurian theropods.1

The fossils were found in the Shanyang Formation, which is about 72 to 66 million years old.2

Scientists have not been able to determine its exact family because there is not enough material.1

Shanyangosaurus was named by Xue and colleagues in 1996.2

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

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For dino experts

Scientific name: Shanyangosaurus
Named by: Xue et al. 19965
Group: Meat-eating dinos
Family / clade: Avetheropoda5
Classification: Theropoda5
Age of the rocks: 72 to 66 million years (Maastrichtian)5
Rock formations: Shanyang5
Countries: China5
Fossil records: 1 in the Paleobiology Database5
Discovery: Shanyangosaurus was named by Xue and colleagues in 1996 based on fossils found in the Shanyang Formation in Shaanxi, China.1 2
Still debated: Scientists are not sure which specific group of theropods Shanyangosaurus belongs to, because only a few bones have been found.1

Where the facts come from

Shanyangosaurus (en.wikipedia.org)
PBDB Taxon (paleobiodb.org)
Details on Shanyangosaurus (dml.reptilis.net)
Shanyangosaurus niupanggouensis | Dinosaur Database by DinoAnimals.com (dinoanimals.com)
Shanyangosaurus 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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