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Yimenosaurus

Say it: yee-muhn-oh-SORE-us

Name means: “Yimen reptile”1

Ate: PlantsLong-necksEarly Jurassic

Yimenosaurus was a big, long-necked plant-eater that lived in China during the Early Jurassic. It walked on four legs and could grow as long as a school bus!1 2

Lived

201 to 200 million years ago4

Early Jurassic

Fossils found in

Yimen County, Yunnan Province, China1 3

Food

Plants2 3

Length

6 to 9 m1 3

estimate

Weight

2 tonnes1

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 1.5 cars

as long as 2 cars parked in a rowas long as 50 bananas end to endas heavy as 67 big dogsas heavy as 400 watermelons

How big was Yimenosaurus compared to YOU?

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cool stuff

Fun facts

Yimenosaurus is known from at least 10 partial skeletons and a skull, so scientists know quite a lot about it.2

Its name honors Yang Zhongjian, the father of Chinese paleontology, who was also called C.C. Young.1

Yimenosaurus had 4 teeth in its upper front jaw, 17 to 18 teeth in each upper cheek, and about 23 teeth in each lower jaw.3

The first fossils of Yimenosaurus were found in 1987 by a team that included a research assistant named Xingyong Zhang.3

Yimenosaurus lived about 195 to 190 million years ago, during the Early Jurassic period.2

Its skull was quite delicate and long, with large, elliptical nostrils and a triangular opening in front of the eye.3

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

?How big was Yimenosaurus?

About 9 metres (30 feet) long and weighed around 2 tonnes (2.2 short tons). That is as long as a school bus.1 2

?What did Yimenosaurus eat?

It was a plant-eater, or herbivore. It had many teeth with small bumps (denticles) to help chew tough plants.2 1

?When did Yimenosaurus live?

It lived during the Early Jurassic period, about 195 to 190 million years ago.2 1

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For dino experts

Scientific name: Yimenosaurus
Named by: Bai et al. 19904
Group: Long-necks
Family / clade: Prosauropoda4
Classification: Sauropodomorpha4
Age of the rocks: 201 to 200 million years (Hettangian)4
Rock formations: Fengjiahe4
Countries: China4
Fossil records: 1 in the Paleobiology Database4
Discovery: Yimenosaurus was named in 1990 by Ziqi Bai, Jie Yang and Guohui Wang based on two skeletons found in Yunnan, China. The species name youngi honors paleontologist C.C. Young.1 2

Where the facts come from

Yimenosaurus (en.wikipedia.org)
Yimenosaurus | Natural History Museum (nhm.ac.uk)
Yimenosaurus, a new genus of Prosauropoda from Yimen County, Yunnan Province (naturalhistory.si.edu)
Yimenosaurus 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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