Stygimoloch
Stygimoloch spinifer
Pronounced:
Stig - ee -
Moe - lok
Diet:
Omnivore (
Meat
&Plant-Eater)
Name Means:
"Styx
Moloch"
(mythology)
Length:
10 feet (3
m)
Height:
5 feet (1.8
m)
Weight:
440 pounds
(200 kilos)
Time:
Late
Cretaceous -
70 MYA
Fossil
remains
for this
Dinosaur
have
been
found in
Western
U.S
A member of the
same family that
includes the
better-known
Pachycephalosaurus
, this dinosaur
was smaller and
had a skull that
wasn't quite as
thick. In 1995,
fossil hunter
Mike Triebold
found a complete
skeleton of this
fascinating
dinosaur. This
was a remarkable
find as before
his discovery,
no member of the
pachycephalosaur
family had been
discovered with
both the head
and body
together. His
find showed that
this dinosaur
could never have
butted heads
like many had
thought. If it
did, it would
probably have
broken its neck!
The ring of
horns that
encircled its
thick skull was
probably used
for display and
it may have been
used as a club
for hitting
others of its
own kind during
courtship. It is
not likely that
it could have
been used as a
serious weapon.
Stygimoloch is
an interesting
dinosaur for a
number of
reasons.
Although it
lived in the
late Cretaceous,
it had a number
of primitive
characteristics.
It had five
fingers, it had
teeth similar to
Stegosaurus
in the back of
its mouth, but
the front was
filled with
sharp incisors
similar to a
carnivore.
Stygimoloch was
originally
discovered in
the late 1800s,
but almost 100
years would pass
from the
discovery of the
first fossil
elements to the
discovery of the
definitive
specimen by
Triebold in
1995. In
between, all of
the remains that
had been found
were
misidentified as
those from a
Pachycephalosaurus
In fact, even
Triebold's
specimen was
initially
misidentified as
Pachycephalosaurus. |
