🦖 Dinosaurs🦕 SauropodomorphJurassicLesser known
Mussaurus
Mussaurus patagonicus
Mussaurus provides some of the earliest evidence of herd behaviour in dinosaurs and shows how sauropodomorphs grew up.
Image: Eva K. · GFDL 1.2 · Wikimedia Commons
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Characteristics
- Scientific name
- Mussaurus patagonicus
- Period
- Early Jurassic (Sinemurian)
- Lived
- 199–192 Ma (199 million years ago)
- Diet
- Herbivore
- Habitat
- Plains, Forest
- Length (estimate)
- 8 m
- Mass (estimate)
- 1,400 kg
- Discovered/described
- 1979 · José Bonaparte and Martín Vince
Description
Mussaurus ('mouse lizard') was named after the tiny skeletons of young animals that were found first; adults grew up to 8 metres long and weighed more than a tonne. Young animals walked on all fours and became bipedal as they grew. Finds of many individuals of different ages in one place point to life in groups.
Habitat
Seasonal river plains in the south of present-day Patagonia.
Fossil sites
Laguna Colorada, Santa Cruz
Laguna Colorada Formation
Cultural profile: Argentina →
Contemporaries in the database
Sources: Mussaurus