EDMONTOSAURUS
Edmontosaurus annectens
Meaning: "Edmonton Lizard"
📊 STATS
Size comparison:
As long as a large school bus!
📖 ABOUT EDMONTOSAURUS
Meet Edmontosaurus, the amazing 'Edmonton Lizard'! This plant-eating dinosaur was a speedy runner from the Late Cretaceous period. Imagine a giant duck-billed dino munching on plants!
Edmontosaurus was a large, plant-eating dinosaur that roamed North America during the Late Cretaceous period, about 73 to 66 million years ago. Its name means 'Edmonton Lizard' because the first fossils were found near Edmonton, in Alberta, Canada. This dinosaur was a type of hadrosaurid, also known as a duck-billed dinosaur, because of its broad, flat snout, perfect for cropping plants.
Edmontosaurus was a big dino, growing up to 13 meters long! It likely lived in herds, munching on leaves, twigs, and other vegetation. Scientists believe Edmontosaurus could run pretty fast, maybe up to 45 kilometers per hour! This helped them escape from predators like Tyrannosaurus rex. Although we don't know exactly how strong its bite was, we know it had lots of teeth to grind up all those plants. Some fossils show evidence of skin impressions, giving us clues about what its skin looked like. Edmontosaurus was a truly remarkable dinosaur that helps us understand what life was like millions of years ago.
🔬 CLASSIFICATION
- Group
- Ornithopoda
- Family
- Hadrosauridae
- Period
- Late Cretaceous (100-66 Ma)
- Era
- 73.0 - 66.0 million years ago
🗺️ DISCOVERY
- Year
- 1917
- Discovered by
- Lawrence Lambe
- Location
- Alberta, Canada
- Fossils found in
- USA, Canada
🎨 SCIENTIFIC ILLUSTRATION
Artistic reconstruction of Edmontosaurus based on fossil evidence
🗺️ WHERE FOSSILS WERE FOUND
USA, Canada
🤓 FUN FACTS
- ✨ Edmontosaurus had hundreds of teeth in its mouth to help it chew tough plants!
- ✨ Scientists think Edmontosaurus may have had a fleshy comb on its head!
- ✨ This dinosaur lived at the same time as Tyrannosaurus Rex!
- ✨ Edmontosaurus could probably run super fast to escape predators!
- ✨ Its name comes from Edmonton, a city in Canada where the first fossils were found.
💡 DID YOU KNOW?
Get this! Some Edmontosaurus fossils have been found with skin impressions, so we know what their skin texture was like! That's like finding a dino in its pajamas!
