Talarurus | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|
Name | Talarurus | |||
Order | Ornithischia | |||
Suborder | Tyreophora | |||
Class | Ankylosauridae | |||
Name Translation | Wicker Tail | |||
Period | Late Cretaceous (95-65 mya) | |||
Location | Mongolia | |||
Diet | Plants | |||
Size | 17 ft (5 m) | |||
Talarurus is only known from a single skull from a single species: Talarurus plicatospineus. Talarurus was discovered and named by a crew of Russian paleontologists led by Evgeny Maleev in 1952.
It is 16.4 feet (5 meters long). Ankylosaurs were some of the last dinosaurs standing before the K/T Extinction 65 million years ago, but Talarurus was one of the earliest members of the breed, dating to about 30 million years before the K/T extinction. Talarurus wasn't huge by the standards of later ankylosaurs like Ankylosaurus and Euoplocephalus, but it still would have been a tough nut to crack for the average tyrannosaur or raptor, a low-slung, heavily armored plant eater with a clubbed, swinging tail (this dinosaur's name, Greek for "wicker tail," derives from the wicker-like tendons that stiffened its tail and helped make it such a deadly weapon).
History of discovery[]
Description[]
Classification[]
Paleobiology[]
Paleoenvironment[]
In popular culture[]
- Two Talarurus appeared in the 2000 Disney CGI film Dinosaur.
Gallery[]
Talarurus/Gallery