Mussaurdes
Sign in to saveMussaurus (meaning "mouse lizard") is a genus of herbivorous sauropodomorph dinosaur that lived in southern Argentina during the Sinemurian stage of the Early Jurassic. It receives its name from the small size of the skeletons of juvenile and infant individuals, which were once the only known specimens of the genus. However, since Mussaurus is now known from adult specimens, the name is something of a misnomer.
Wikidata facts
- Parent taxon
- Sauropodomorpha
- Image
- Mussaurus patagonicus life restoration.png
- Length
- 3.0
Show 9 more facts
- taxon common name
- ムスサウルス
- taxon name
- Mussaurus
- Commons category
- Mussaurus
- taxon rank
- genus
- start time
- 215000000-
- end time
- 203000000-
- time period
- Late Triassic
- location of discovery
- Argentina
- main food source
- herbivore
Sources (2)
via Wikidata · CC0
~6 min read
Encyclopedic overview
8 sectionsContents
- Discovery
- Classification
- Palaeobiology
- Social behaviour
- Growth
- References
- Further reading
- External links
Mussaurus (meaning "mouse lizard") is a genus of herbivorous sauropodomorph dinosaur that lived in southern Argentina during the Sinemurian stage of the Early Jurassic. It receives its name from the small size of the skeletons of juvenile and infant individuals, which were once the only known specimens of the genus. However, since Mussaurus is now known from adult specimens, the name is something of a misnomer.
In its early stages of life, Mussaurus was a small quadrupedal herbivore, walking on all four legs. As it grew up, the changes in body proportions may have led its centre of mass to move backwards towards its pelvis. Adults would have been medium-sized bipedal herbivores, measuring up to long and weighing up to .
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Mussaurdes” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.