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Saurornithoides
What kind of animal is Saurornithoides?
Saurornithoides was a small, fast and smart dinosaur that lived in the Late Cretaceous period.
It belonged to the troodontid family, which had bird-like features and large brains.
It had a long, low head with sharp teeth and large eyes that gave it good vision.
It also had a retractable claw on each foot that it used for hunting.
It probably ate small mammals or reptiles that lived in the Gobi Desert.
It was one of the first dinosaurs to be discovered in Mongolia by American paleontologist Henry Fairfield Osborn.
Saurornithoides means "bird-like lizard" in Greek.
What is the animal Saurornithoides known for?
Saurornithoides means "bird-like lizard" in Greek, referring to its bird-like skull and features.
Some of the distinctive features of Saurornithoides are:
It had large eye sockets and stereoscopic vision, which gave it good depth perception and night vision.
It had a long, low head, a depressed muzzle, sharp teeth and a relatively large brain.
It had an enlarged retractable claw on the second toe of each foot, that was moderately curved and used for hunting and defense.
It had six sacral vertebrae, which is more than most other troodontids and indicates a more derived position in the evolutionary tree.
It was about 3 meters long and weighed about 40 kilograms.
The type and only species is Saurornithoides mongoliensis, which was named by Henry Fairfield Osborn in 1924.
A juvenile specimen of Saurornithoides was described in 1993 and showed that it was well developed at birth and probably required little to no parental care.
Saurornithoides is one of the most well-known and studied troodontids, and it provides insights into the life history, behavior and evolution of this fascinating group of dinosaurs.
Where does the Saurornithoides live?
Saurornithoides was a small, bird-like dinosaur that lived in Mongolia during the Late Cretaceous period, about 83,6 to 66 million years ago.
Saurornithoides probably lived in open habitats, such as grasslands or deserts, where it could hunt small animals like lizards, mammals, or insects.