Chaoyangsaurus
Chaoyangsaurus youngi
Pronounced: Chow - young - Sore -
us
Diet: Herbivore (plant-eater)
Name Means: "Chaoyang Lizard"
Length: unknown
Height: unknown
Weight: unknown
Time: Middle to Late Jurassic -
160 mya
Fossil remains for this Dinosaur have been found in Asia
Chaoyangsaurus is a very important member of the family of horned
dinosaurs because it shows they lived during the Jurassic period.
Before the discovery of this little dinosaur, it was believed that
the horned dinosaurs, which include
Triceratops first showed up in the Cretaceous period. This
early family member lived before
Protoceratops and
Psittacosaurus which are considered some of the earliest
members of this family. Like the other early family members,
Chaoyangsaurus is also from Asia.
First discovered in the early 1980's, rumors of this dinosaur
floated around the paleontological community until it was formally
described in 1999. It had previously been known by a somewhat
different spelling, Chaoyoungosaurus, but its formal description
changed that. This dinosaur seems to show an evolutionary link
between the ceratopsian dinosaurs and the heterodontosauridae. |
