Udanoceratops
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Udanoceratops (meaning "Udan horn face") was a ceratopsian dinosaur. It lived during the Late Cretaceous. Its fossils were found in Mongolia.
Discovery and Species
Udanoceratops was first described by Kurzanov in 1992, from a large skull 60cm long which was moderately well preserved. It appears to be the largest bipedal neoceratopsian found to date. The skull has very little horn or frill and the animal is estimated at about 4 metres long.Udanoceratops Species
- U. tschizhovi (type)
Classification
Udanoceratops belonged to the Ceratopsia (the name is Greek for "horned face"), a group of herbivorous dinosaurs with parrot-like beaks which thrived in North America and Asia during the Cretaceous Period. Within the order, Chinnery places it within the Leptoceratopsidae as the only Asian representative, along with the North American Leptoceratops, Montanoceratops and Prenoceratops.Diet
Udanoceratops, like all Ceratopsians, was a herbivore. During the Cretaceous, flowering plants were "geographically limited on the landscape", and so it is likely that this dinosaur fed on the predominant plants of the era: ferns, cycads and conifers. It would have used its sharp Ceratopsian beak to bite off the leaves or needles.References
External links
- http://www.dinosaurvalley.com/groups.html
- http://208.164.121.55/reference/dinosaur/dodson.htm
- http://www.users.qwest.net/~jstweet1/ceratopia.htm
- http://dinosauricon.com/genera/udanoceratops.html
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