The earliest dinosaurs
The earliest dinosaur fossils were found in the rocks of the Triassic Period. It is probably Archaeopteryx, which first appeared 228 million years ago and was discovered in Argentina in 1992, and its skull resembles the skull of an alligator, with curved sharp teeth. It is a small carnivorous dinosaur.
Southern crucifixosaurs are one of the early dinosaurs, this carnivorous dinosaur is about 2 meters long, although small, but very fierce, and likes to go out in groups to prey on animals larger than themselves. Become "the first dinosaur hunter to prey on large animals". Its light weight, slender and powerful hind limbs make it easy to chase prey, and its long jaw has neat sharp teeth, which is more conducive to prey. Herrera is a bipedal carnivorous dinosaur excavated from Argentina. It lived about 230 million years ago. The body is about 3 meters long, with pointed teeth protruding in the front of the palate, thin and light bones, and feeds on small reptiles. Herrillaosaurus had many similarities with later carnivorous dinosaurs: sharp teeth, huge claws, and powerful hind limbs.
Early herbivorous dinosaurs, also relatively small, such as pisanodolus and beaked tooth dragon, their bodies were about 1 meter long, with fangs, shaped like pigs, generally carnivorous dinosaurs preyed on.
In the early dinosaur world, there were more carnivorous dinosaurs and their body size was not very large, but after millions of years, herbivorous dinosaurs grew larger and larger, even several times more than carnivorous dinosaurs, or more than ten times, thus becoming the ruler of the earth on a par with carnivorous dinosaurs, and this rule lasted for 160 million years.
The largest and most ferocious dinosaur
The average person thinks that the largest and most ferocious dinosaur is the Tyrannosaurus rex.
In fact, the largest and fiercest dinosaur in the dinosaur era is not it, but another "dragon".
In 1955, a huge dinosaur skeleton fossil was found in Argentina, South America. Thus denying the title of T-Rex.
The dragon's neck was short and thick, its body was very strong, its limbs were strong, it was good at running, and its tail was thick and large, at least 4.5 meters long. If any unlucky animal is attacked by its tail, it will not die and be disabled.
As the dragon ran, it was fast, with a large mouth open, revealing its huge, sharp and sharp teeth, and its thick panting sound alone was like the roar of a tiger now.
In the age of dinosaurs, there were also small and medium-sized carnivorous dinosaurs, which flipped each other to the ground and began to open their mouths.
Next to its fossils, scientists have also found some fossilized skeletons of herbivorous dinosaurs, which may be the remnants of its food.
Such a huge and ferocious dinosaur, at that time, must have lived a very dashing and comfortable life.
The smallest dinosaur
In the mesozoic dinosaur world, carnivorous dinosaurs occupied everything.00
Where large carnivorous dinosaurs can't patronize, who would dare to dominate there? Even small flying insects are not spared, that is, small theropod dinosaurs, such as small bird dragons and megalosaurs.
Among them, Megalosaurus is the smallest dinosaur that lived in that space.
Although it is small, it is also very fierce, and it is a strict "destiny" master for the small beings on this surface, and when they are hungry, they will never be merciful.
In 1861, the first fossil of Megalosaurus was found in the slate limestone slate of Sorenhofen in Bavaria, Germany.
It was only then that people first came to know the world's smallest dinosaur.
The dragon is 0.6 meters long, about the size of a chicken, and its structure is light. The teeth are small, curved, and as sharp as a sword. All of the teeth of the lower jaw grow before the eye socket.
Among the fossils of a megalosaur found in Germany, a fossil of a lizard skeleton was found. It could be the last meal of this Jawed Dragon.
Lizards are the staple food of the dragons, and as long as it appears, the lizards will not be able to escape bad luck. Even a small insect flying in the air can be quickly grasped, crushed, and then eaten by its claws.
The heaviest dinosaur
When it comes to the heaviest dinosaurs, everyone immediately thinks of some large dinosaurs such as brachiosaurus and diplodocus.
Like the wrist dragon, more than 20 meters long and weighing dozens of tons, Liang Long is also.
The sauropods of the late Jurassic period were the largest and heaviest in the dinosaur world, and although the behemoths such as Brachiosaurus, Mamenxiosaurus and Lepidocus were sauropods, they were not the heaviest in the dinosaur world.
On the land of the late Jurassic Period, there was a dinosaur that caused a heavy roar and a slight tremor on the ground every step it took. It is the Earthquake Dragon.
In 1985, some remarkable and surprising dinosaur skeleton fossils were found in New Jersey, USA, which is the skeleton fossil of earthquake dragons.
Scientists have speculated about its size based on the indice of the earthquake dragon, which is about 40 meters long and weighs about 100 tons. This number is enough for Brachiosaurus and Diplodocus to give up their heaviest seats.
The English name of the earthquake dragon is "selsmosauz", which means "earthquake shaker". It had the size of a sauropod dinosaur with a long neck, a short, bulky body, square-shaped legs, large, flat feet, and a long tail.
So far, the largest and heaviest dinosaur is EarthquakeOsaurus, but is there any dinosaur larger and heavier than Earthquakeosaurus? Further discoveries and studies by scientists are yet to be made.
The fastest dinosaur
The predators of the animal world each have a set of weapons and methods that are effective in catching prey.
For example, the tiger's sharp claws, fangs, and huge body.
The lightning-fast running of cheetahs also forms a unique method of hunting.
In the world of dinosaurs, in order to survive, they all play their own advantages, among them, there are those who are good at running.
For example, chicken dragon, wood tooth dragon, emu magpie dragon and so on. Among them, the fastest runner is the Running Bird Dragon, which looks like a giant bird without feathers.
The Bird Runner was the theropod long-distance running champion during the Cretaceous Period. The beak-shaped mouth has no teeth, the neck is relatively long, and the hind legs are thin and long, which is conducive to running. The tail is stiff, and when running, the tail is straight and backward, and it can be used to grasp the direction when running.
Found in Canada, Itachiosaurus was about 3.5 meters long, and among carnivorous dinosaurs, this is a small dinosaur. But it ran extremely fast, and scientists calculated the speed of the running bird dragon from the footprint fossils, which was about 65 kilometers per hour. At that time, there was no dinosaur comparable to it.
The smartest dinosaurs
We know that a person, smart is his high IQ, and the high IQ is determined by the brain content, a person's brain content is high, the proportion of brain surface area and human body surface area is large, it shows that this person is smart. Dinosaurs are no exception, but which dinosaur is the smartest?
That is the lesser-known sawtooth dragon, the sawtooth dragon appeared at the end of the Cretaceous period, belonged to the theropods, its size is not large, only about 2 meters, perhaps in order to survive, they "racked their brains" for food all day long. As the saying goes, the more the brain is used, the smarter it is, so its brain slowly evolves, and therefore, it becomes smarter.
Although, people have not yet found a complete fossil skeleton of the serrated dragon, but biologists based on some of its bone pieces and teeth. Its body shape and size have been speculated, and its brain capacity has also been speculated.
By far, sawtooth had the largest brain volume and the highest IQ of any dinosaur, and the large brain capacity made sawtooth's eyesight and hearing so good that they could even pounce at night. So much so that it lived in the Mesozoic for quite some time.
The stupidest dinosaurs
Smart and stupid are relative, there are the smartest dinosaurs, then there must be the stupidest dinosaurs.
Of course, when you say stupid dinosaurs, you don't mean stupid enough to live. Even particularly stupid dinosaurs know how to find food, how to have children, and how to protect themselves.
So, who took this "champion"?
It is a very famous dinosaur, called "Stegosaurus". Although scientists have identified him as the "number one idiot" in the dinosaur world, this "idiot" also survived on Earth for more than 100 million years and did not become extinct until the early Cretaceous Period.
Stegosaurus flourished in the middle of the Jurassic period, a herbivorous dinosaur found in North America and about 9 meters long. The biggest feature is that the head is particularly small, and there are many bone plates like swords on the back.
It's stupid because of its tiny brain. After the stegosaurus brain test, it was found that it was slightly larger than a cat's brain, about twice the size of a cat's brain, and not as big as a golf ball, which is about 1 or 2, less than 2 twice.
We simply can't imagine that a brain of less than 2 pairs directs a body that is 9 meters long and weighs 1-2 tons. Think about it, such a big brain, eating, walking is enough to control it, and it may not be able to command it.
Of course, the stegosaurus also has a nerve ball on its hip, which can also help its brain to direct it. But this neurosphere only innervates and controls its hind limbs and tail, and does not completely solve the substantive problem, so Stegosaurus is still the lowest IQ dinosaur.
Dinosaurs that ate the most
In the dense jungle of the Jurassic, herbivorous dinosaurs serenely weave through the woods, their tall bodies stretching their necks to eat the young leaves of the treetops, and the short bodies bowing their heads and nibbling on the ferns under the trees.
In general, herbivorous dinosaurs ate a relatively large amount, so eating became their most important job.
But the largest amount of food is also counted as brachiosaurus. This large sauropod dinosaur, originally found in Tanzania, Africa, is more than 20 meters long, 12 meters tall, and weighs more than 50 tons, so its biggest task every day is to fill its huge belly to meet the needs of that huge body.
Maybe some people will think otherwise, they think dinosaurs are cold-blooded animals that don't need to eat much in a day. However, scientists know how much brachiosaurus ate based on fossil feces left by dinosaurs hundreds of millions of years ago. Brachiosaurus pulls feces more than a meter high at a time. It can be seen that its food intake is amazing.
This wrist dragon has a slightly lower amount of food than the Unreal Dragon. People generally call unreal dragons Thunder Dragons. It was also a Jurassic dinosaur, first discovered in North America, weighing more than 20 tons. Equivalent to 40 head of cattle. A cow generally eats dozens of pounds of grass a day, although it cannot be calculated in this way, but it can still be roughly seen that the amount of food of the thunder dragon can be seen.
In the dinosaur family, the third largest food intake is Damala dragon. Damaraosaurus belongs to sauropods and was first discovered in China. It looks like a giraffe and weighs up to 20 tons.
The most powerful dinosaur with claws
The armor claw is one of the main predatory weapons of carnivorous dinosaurs, and it is generally believed that the largest and most ferocious dinosaurs must have the fastest and sharpest claws.
This is not the case.
Some small and medium-sized carnivorous dinosaurs compete to develop their own "unique weapons" in the brutal competition for survival.
So who was the dinosaur with the sharpest claws? It is a dinosaur.
Dinosaurs were theropod dinosaurs that lived during the Cretaceous Period. Fossilized bones were found in North America. Dinosaurs are about 3 meters long and are distinguished by a large machete-like claw on each of their second toes.
In 1969, Ostrom in the United States conducted an in-depth study of dinosaur claws. He found that the limbs of the dinosaur were long and powerful, and the bones were very light, which showed that the dinosaur was good at running, and its tail vertebrae had many bone rods, which could keep the tail firm and thus control the direction so well that it caught its prey while running. But its biggest feature is that it has a pair of feet with a special structure. It walks with its hind limbs, has four toes on its feet, each toe has sharp claws up to 15 cm long, the second toe is particularly large, like a long and curved hook, there are three fingers on the forelimbs, the fingers also have long claws, the claws correspond to each other, can grasp food, when the dinosaur encounters prey, first use its hind claws to pounce forward, so that it is deeply rooted into the body of the prey, and then, with the front paws to tear the prey apart. Dinosaurs used this weapon to make themselves one of the most ferocious groups of dinosaurs.
The most powerful dinosaur with the tail
It has long been believed that herbivorous dinosaurs were slaughtered in the dinosaur world.
Experts believe that the size of herbivorous dinosaurs is generally several times larger than that of carnivorous dinosaurs, because herbivorous dinosaurs evolved in order to preserve themselves, so that when carnivorous dinosaurs face such a behemoth, it is not easy to start.
However, once the herbivorous dinosaurs are chased by hordes of carnivorous dinosaurs, no matter how large they are, they may not be able to escape bad luck.
To this end, they began to develop their own defensive weapons, so that the other side should also think twice when attacking themselves.
The tail has always been a weapon for dinosaurs to attack and defend, and this advantage is not a carnivorous dinosaur, but a herbivorous dinosaur.
This dinosaur is called Ankylosaurus.
Ankylosaurus was a large herbivorous dinosaur found in North America, up to 10.7 meters long, and the biggest feature was a large mallet tail.
Ankylosaurus is a dinosaur that can fight with carnivorous dinosaurs at critical times.
The entire body of the ankylosaurus, including the head, face, and eyelids, was covered with thick bone scales and bone spurs, and the sharp claws of the carnivorous dinosaur could not grasp it at all. It has a strong and robust tail, and a heavy tail hammer at the tail, which is made of bone plates that heal together, uses strong tail muscles to swing it, and when attacked by ferocious carnivorous dinosaurs, it uses this "meteor hammer" of at least a few tens of kilograms to sweep past and take its damage.
Therefore, no matter how powerful the carnivorous dinosaurs are, they generally do not dare to mess with this "tank" in the dinosaur world.
Dinosaur with the longest tail
In 1911, the German paleontologist Eberhard Flegh discovered the fossil of a palalodrome in Tanzania, Africa.
Balolong was a plantational sauropod dinosaur weighing about 40 tons, heavier than 8 elephants, and 24 meters long, making it the largest dinosaur.
Its biggest feature is that it has a long tail, and so far, among all the dinosaurs that have been discovered, the tail of The Baro dragon is the longest, reaching more than 20 meters, and it is composed of 82 bones. The 9-meter-long neck of the Barorom is balanced by its extremely long tail. In addition, the long tail can also be used as a defensive weapon, like a whip, to attack enemies that attack it.
It is estimated that it eats 1500 kilograms of food a day, so it is conceivable that its small head directs the small mouth to eat non-stop, only in this way can it meet the energy required by the huge body, even so, it cuts the branches and grass stems with its teeth and does not chew, it directly swallows the dates into the stomach, with the help of the stomach stones, grinds the food in the stomach, so as to digest. In addition, it has a common feature of sauropods - the nose is long on the top of the head.
Dinosaurs with the sharpest teeth
In the dinosaur family, whether it is a carnivorous dinosaur or a herbivorous dinosaur, the teeth are very sharp.
But the sharpest teeth are still flesh-eating sharks. Sharks are the fiercest animals in the ocean, and they frighten many marine animals and even humans, especially their teeth. Like sharks, the carnivorous sharks have huge fangs. The flesh-eating shark dragon is about 8 meters long, the head is particularly large, very smart, they run fast, and they are a big "murderer" in the dinosaur family.
Tyrannosaurus rex was the runner-up of the sharp-toothed dinosaur group. Living in the Cretaceous, Tyrannosaurus rex was a sauropod dinosaur first found in North America and eastern Asia, and they were about 12 meters long. Their teeth are like steak knives, and their jaws are so powerful that they produce a lot of bite force.
Albertosaurus had some worse teeth than those of The Carnivoratosaurus and Tyrannosaurus rex, but their teeth were also sharp. Albertosaurus was a theropod dinosaur that was first discovered in the United States and Canada and was about 8 meters long. Their teeth were like saws, but the tip of their sharp teeth was bent backwards, so it was very difficult to get out once they were bitten by Albertolong's teeth.
Dinosaurs with the most teeth
Speaking of teeth, everyone must think of the teeth of those fierce and mighty carnivorous dinosaurs, but in fact, they are not, the teeth are sharp, but the number is not necessarily the largest.
The largest number of teeth is the duck-billed dragon.
Duck-billed dragons belonged to the ornithopods of plant-eating dinosaurs, which were the most prosperous dinosaurs in the late Cretaceous period.
The anterior part of the skull and jaw of the duck-billed dragon became wider and shaped much like a flattened "duck's beak", hence the name.
The number of teeth of the duck-billed dragon is amazing, the structure is also very special, in its large flat mouth, there are more than 500 teeth on each gum bed up and down, left and right, so that for the typical duck-billed dragon, the total number of teeth is as many as 2,000, these teeth are densely arranged in several rows, some are also arranged in a crossed arrangement, once the teeth of the duck-billed dragon are worn, the surface of the teeth will become as uneven as the paved road. This and the grinding disc are a truth that helps to grind food into a paste. After the teeth in use are worn, they are gradually pushed out, further worn, and then replaced with new teeth. Duck-billed dragons were plant-eating, and it appears that they were able to use this pair of teeth to chop up food and chew it up.
Because of the special beak structure of the duck-billed dragon, it is very suitable for fishing for food in the water, as evidenced by the webbing between its toes. Moreover, the duck-billed dragon had a thin and long tail, which seems to be helpful for swimming.
Some duck-billed dragons have decorations on the top of their heads, and the anterior jaws and nasal bones of duck-billed dragons with top decorations are not in their original positions, but retreat to the top of their heads, hollow, and can store air inside, so that duck-billed dragons can stay under the water for a long time.
Duck-billed dragons generally inhabit rivers and swampy areas, and as soon as they find an enemy attacking them, they immediately flee into the water, dive into the water, and wait for the disaster to pass. If it is a patient enemy, it can only become a good meal for others.
The body of the duck-billed dragon is generally very large, more than ten meters long and weighs more than twenty tons, but there are also small ones, only a few meters long, and the weight is only a few tons. Its forelimbs are short and its hindlimbs are thick, and it walks mainly on its hind limbs, and sometimes crawls on all fours.
Fossils of the shoulder joints and wrists of the duck-billed dragon have been found in the mines of the Takashima Coal Mine in Nagashima Prefecture, Japan, and its skin has also been found in the United States.
The loudest crying dinosaur
All dinosaurs were able to make sounds, and sounds were a tool for dinosaurs to communicate with each other. Some dinosaurs make very small noises that can only be heard when they are close. Some dinosaurs make a loud sound that can be heard from a distance. Other dinosaurs make louder sounds, and if this sound rings in front of your ears, it may deafen your ears.
In the dinosaur family, the loudest roar is the pseudo-ctenophora. Ctenophora was first discovered in North America and is a food-eating dinosaur. Their voices do not come out of their mouths, but through the crown on their heads. The voice sounded a little hoarse.
In the dinosaur family, the second most roaring is the dragon. The dragon was a theropod dinosaur that lived in Argentina, South America. The dragon's voice was low, very penetrating, and it could be heard very clearly from far, far away.
In the dinosaur family, the third place in the roar is Megalosaurus. Megalosaurus was also a theropod dinosaur, living in Europe in those days, they were very small, only about 60 cm long. When they are about to bark, they gather all their strength and make a high-pitched sound.
Dinosaurs with ferocious habits
The Jurassic large carnivorous dinosaurs were descendants of the Triassic dinosaur, ornithischiosaurus. Throughout the Jurassic Period, as the body of the giant plant-eating dinosaur increased, so did the size of the carnivorous dinosaur.
The largest carnivorous dinosaur of the Jurassic was the mighty Allosaurus: 11 meters long, about the length of a large passenger car, with terrible claws on its three-toed hind feet, it was with this daunting weapon that it slaughtered on the lands of the Jurassic. When the prey is killed, it then uses its dexterous "hands" and sharp spatula-like teeth to open its stomach and tear it up. Allosaurus weighed 2 tons and could not have run too fast, however, the vast majority of plant-eating dinosaurs were more bulky, so there were few prey that escaped under its pursuit. Fossil footprints show that it once crossed mud ponds and hunted down large sauropods, taking more than two meters in each step. It can be seen that Allosaurus is a "hunter" full of vitality!
Another close relative of Allosaurus is called Thexodon, which is about half the size of Allosaurus, and it is the same as Allosaurus, the bones above the eyes are thickened, fighting, there is no "concussion" worries, especially brave. Horned-nosed dragons also had a bone spike at the tip of their nose, hence the name.
While the large carnivorous dragons were enjoying a delicious meal, a group of small carnivorous dinosaurs smelled the meat and sometimes rushed over to grab a few slices of fresh meat to fill their hunger. Among these animals, there is a small bird dragon, about 2 meters long, with a pair of long muscular legs, a slender tail, stiff, long and flexible fingers, at a glance it is known that it is a lightweight Triassic animal - the descendant of the colodox, it maintains and carries forward the advantages of its ancestors "fast-legged hunters", often feeding on small mammals and large dinosaur cubs, and even those pterosaurs who are unfortunate to fall to the ground due to incomplete development and fright are also the targets of their attacks.
Large carnivores like Allosaurus and Horned-nosed Dragon were so bulky that it was impossible to search for prey hidden in the bushes. In those places, plesiosaurs could instead play a role, and they were natural enemies of all small animals. Sometimes, they also play the role of "scavengers", similar to today's hyenas and jackals, after the large carnivorous dragons have eaten and drunk enough to leave, they come back to clean the battlefield and eat the remaining cups cold.
The smallest dinosaur ever discovered is Hidenosaurus. A close relative of the ornithischiaurus, the body was smaller, only 70 cm long when it reached adulthood, except for the long tail, the body was only the size of a hen, and it did not pose a threat to any other dinosaur, but it was more than enough for them to deal with smaller mammals, small lizards and insects. It also has a spirit of perseverance - when its prey flees to the tree for refuge, it will also follow and climb the tree. Because Itachiosaurus had such predatory characteristics, don't look at it as small, it is still a successful conqueror in the age of dinosaurs.
A dinosaur that can climb trees
Earlier we have given a general introduction to stegosaurus to the reader. In recent years, another strange type of dinosaur has been found in the Sichuan Basin, which belongs to the ornithopod dinosaurs like Stegosaurus, and there are very perfect fossil specimens preserved here, that is, a "tree-climbing dinosaur" - prismatic dragon.
Let's first understand the origin of the prismatic toothed dragon.
Many bipedal walks have been lived in the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods of Earth's history. Dinosaurs with two legs standing and only 3 toes on their hind limbs appear to be very similar at first glance to some of the features of modern birds, so paleontological taxonomy classifies such dinosaurs as "ornithopods" in the ornithischium class.
Ornithopods belonged to a branch of the ornithischian dinosaurs. Ornithopod fossils have been found in North and South America, Europe, Africa and Asia. The fossil materials of ornithischia ornithistrels found in China are also very rich, such as the "iguanodon" found in Inner Mongolia, and the "Qingdao dragon" and "Shandong dragon" found in Shandong and Heilongjiang. However, these ornithopods were all Cretaceous dinosaurs.
Are there any fossils of ornithopods from the Jurassic era in China? Yes, and there are quite a few. They are mainly concentrated in the Sichuan Basin and the Late Jurassic strata, and there are 5 kinds of bird-footed dragon fossils such as Sanbalong, Yandulong, Gongbu Dragon, Xiaolong, and Linglong. In paleontological taxonomy , they all belong to the family Priscosaurus.
The first animal fossils humans knew about dinosaurs were "Iguanodon", which belonged to Ornithischia. In 1822, the Mantels in England discovered iguanodon fossils, which opened the prelude to human research on dinosaur fossils. In 1878, a world-shattering discovery was that more than 30 fossil iguanodactyl skeletons were found at a time in the Bernisha coal mine in Belgium, of which 17 complete skeletons were preserved in the Belgian National Museum of Natural History.
In 1944, a fossil of iguanodon was found in Weiyuan County in the Sichuan Basin, and Professor Yang Zhongjian studied it and named it "Yue's Tripalong". Unfortunately, due to the fragmentation of the fossil material of Tripasaurus, it is not certain that it is an iguanodon fossil. The iguanodon fossil materials found in China are very fragmented, and this kind of dinosaur fossils are rarely found in other provinces in China, and they are not discussed in detail here.
Now, let's focus on the peculiar diplodocus. Because the fossils of prismatic dragons preserved in the Sichuan Basin are not only rich in materials, but also have a complete skeleton and a perfect skull, we should focus on it.
Living in the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods, Priscosaurus was a small dinosaur. The body length is generally 1 to 2 meters, and the body structure is quite light. Its forelimbs are short, its hindlimbs are long, its limbs are hollow, and it walks on two feet. The anterior maxilla has teeth, the front of the mandible retains a bone tooth, and the belt is typical of the four-way type, so it also belongs to the ornithischian dinosaurs.
The hind limbs of Prismatics had 4 toes, the fifth toe has been degenerated; the toes are long and flexible. The forelimbs have 5 toes, the fifth toe is small and at right angle to the carpal bone, and the toe end has slender claws. Because of the above-mentioned tectonic features on its limbs, many paleontologists have speculated that dipterosaurs were a type of tree-climbing dinosaur. Because of its light body, flexible "hands" and feet, suitable for grasping and climbing branches, it lives an arboreal life in the jungle, feeding on the young branches and leaves of plants. Arboreal life is also a good way for prismatic dragons to escape attacks from meat eaters and protect themselves.
Regarding the habits of the diplodocus, paleontologists have long had mixed opinions. Some scholars have a negative view of its "arboreal" view. Exactly what its living habits are, it is necessary to find more fossils to study before the correct conclusions can be made.