Shunosaurus

Skeletal reconstruction of Shunosaurus lii in Beijing Museum of Natural History

• Sichuan (China)

• S. lii
• S. ziliujingensis, nomen dubium

Shunosaurus ( German: "lizard of Sichuan ) " is the scientific name of a genus of sauropod dinosaur whose fossil remains from the middle Jurassic originate ( Bathonian to Callovian ) of today's China. The term Shunosaurus comes from the word " Shu ", which is an old name for the Chinese province of Sichuan, in which the first fossils of a Shunosaurus were discovered. Shunosaurus shared its habitat with the other sauropods Datousaurus, Omeisaurus and Protognathosaurus and the ornithopods Xiaosaurus, the early and the carnivorous theropod dinosaurs, Stegosaurus Huayangosaurus Gasosaurus.

Discovery and species

Shunosaurus is known by 20 complete or nearly complete fossil skeletons today. Due to the numerous finds he is likely to be anatomically seen one of the most sauropods. Said fossils are all from the Lower Shaximiao formation in Zigong, Sichuan. The first scientific description of the type species Shunosaurus lii took place in 1983 by Dong, Zhou and Zhang. A second type, however, Shunosaurus ziliujingensis was never scientifically described and is due to this fact as a nomen dubium. Skeletons of Shunosaurus are now exhibited in the Museum of Zigong Dinosaur and the Beijing Museum of Natural History.

System

Shunosaurus is now considered as basal Eusauropode. A membership to Cetiosauridae is now rejected by most paleontologists. Presumably he was related to Rhoetosaurus whose fossils from Queensland, Australia come.

Anatomy

With a length of 9 to 10 meters and a weight of three tons Shunosaurus was pretty small for a sauropod. His skull was short and flat with sturdy teeth which, unlike more developed sauropods were not just in the front jaw. In 1989 it was discovered that at the tail end of Shunosaurus a small, formed from fused tail vertebrae and also was studded with spikes "club ". Most likely it served the defense against predators.