Dino card No. 1889 of 2,027

Venenosaurus

Say it: ven-EN-o-SOR-us

Name means: “poison lizard”1

Ate: PlantsLong-necksEarly Cretaceous

Venenosaurus was a long-necked plant eater that stomped around Utah about 112 million years ago. It was a small sauropod, but still as long as a school bus and as heavy as a big elephant.1

Lived

121 to 113 million years ago3

Early Cretaceous

Fossils found in

Utah, USA, in the Cedar Mountain Formation1 3

Food

Plants3

Length

up to 12 m1

estimate

Weight

up to 6 tonnes1

Height

3.05 to 3.96 m2

shoulder height

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

How big was it?

How long was it?

How tall was it?

shoulder height

How heavy was it?

as heavy as 4 cars

as long as 2.5 cars parked in a rowas long as 67 bananas end to endabout as heavy as an elephantas heavy as 1200 watermelonsas tall as 2 doors stacked up

How big was Venenosaurus compared to YOU?

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

cool stuff

Fun facts

Venenosaurus had very slender arm bones, even more slender than those of many other sauropods like Alamosaurus and Saltasaurus.1

Its name comes from the Poison Strip Member, the rock layer where it was found, and 'veneno' means poison in Latin.1

Scientists found bones of both an adult and a baby Venenosaurus at the same site, which helps them learn how these giants grew.1

Venenosaurus was closely related to Cedarosaurus, another sauropod from Utah, but its bones were a bit different.1

The first fossils were found in 1998 by a volunteer named Tony DiCroce, and the species name dicrocei honors him.1

Its tail vertebrae look like those of Aeolosaurus and Gondwanatitan, sauropods from South America, showing how widespread these dinosaurs were.1

AI-made picture of Venenosaurus — An AI-made picture of how Venenosaurus 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 Venenosaurus

?How big was Venenosaurus?

About 12 metres (39 feet) long. It weighed around 6 metric tons (6.6 short tons), about as heavy as a large elephant.1 2

?What did Venenosaurus eat?

It was a plant eater. Its long neck helped it reach high leaves and branches that other plant-eaters could not get to.2

?Why is it named Venenosaurus?

The name Venenosaurus means 'poison lizard' in Latin. It comes from the Poison Strip Member of the rock layer where its fossils were found, not because the dinosaur was poisonous.1 2

?When did Venenosaurus live?

Venenosaurus lived during the Early Cretaceous Period, about 125 to 113 million years ago.1 2

Ask Rex about Venenosaurus

Rex only answers questions about this page. 3 questions a day.

Rex is an AI and can make mistakes. He runs on servers in the EU and questions are never saved. Never type your name or other personal things.

Myth buster

Myth: Some people think all sauropods were gigantic, but Venenosaurus was relatively small.

Truth: Venenosaurus was about 12 metres long and weighed about 6 metric tons, which is small for a sauropod.1

For dino experts

Scientific name: Venenosaurus
Named by: Tidwell et al. 20013
Group: Long-necks
Family / clade: Brachiosauridae3
Classification: Sauropodomorpha > Sauropoda > Macronaria3
Age of the rocks: 121 to 113 million years (Aptian)3
Rock formations: Cedar Mountain3
Countries: USA3
Fossil records: 1 in the Paleobiology Database3
Discovery: In 1998, volunteers from the Denver Museum of Natural History, including Tony DiCroce, found fossils at a site in Utah called Tony's Bone Bed. In 2001, Virginia Tidwell and colleagues named the new dinosaur Venenosaurus dicrocei.1
Still debated: Scientists are not sure if some fossils from Dalton Wells Quarry belong to Venenosaurus or to its close relative Cedarosaurus.1

Where the facts come from

Venenosaurus (en.m.wikipedia.org)
Venenosaurus Utah’s “Poison Lizard” from Early Cretaceous (thedinosaurs.org)
Venenosaurus 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.

Rex is hungry! Dino Wiki is a dad's project for his dino-loving son, free with no ads. Grown-ups can feed Rex a snack to help keep it online.Feed Rex