Deviation Actions
Description
A scene from Jurassic North Africa about 163 Mya. The following are descriptions taken and edited from Wikipedia.
"Afrovenator is a genus of megalosaurid theropod dinosaur from the middle Jurassic Period of northern Africa. It was a bipedal predator, with three claws on each hand.
The remains of Afrovenator were discovered in 1993 in the Tiourarén Formation. The formation was originally thought to be Cretaceous but further and more accurate studies put it as mid-Jurassic in age, dating Afrovenator to the Bathonian to Oxfordian stages, between 164 and 161 mya. The sauropod Jobaria, whose remains were first mentioned in the same paper which named Afrovenator, is also known from this formation.
Afrovenator is known from a single relatively complete skeleton, holotype UC OBA 1, featuring most of the skull, minus its top and lower jaw, apart from the prearticular bone. Other parts found include parts of the spinal column, partial forelimbs, a partial pelvis, and parts of the hind limbs. This skeleton is housed at the University of Chicago.
Judging from the one skeleton known, this dinosaur was approximately eight meters (26 feet) long, from snout to tail tip, and had a weight of up to one tonne. The paleontologist Sereno stressed that the general build was gracile and that the forelimbs and the lower leg were relatively long. A long shinbone indicates a quick runner.
Most analyses place Afrovenator within the Megalosauridae, which was formerly a "wastebasket family" which contained many large and hard-to-classify theropods, but has since been redefined in a meaningful way, as a sister taxon to the family Spinosauridae within the Megalosauroidea."
"Jobaria was a genus of sauropod dinosaur that lived in the current-day Niger during the middle Jurassic Period, between 164–161 million years ago. The genus is named after a local mythical giant beast, Jobar, whose bones some locals believed the fossils to be. The specific name tiguidensis comes from the cliff of Tiguidi, the site of discovery.
Discovered in the fall of 1997, during a four-month expedition to the Sahara desert led by paleontologist Dr. Paul Sereno, it was found in a mass-death site in the Tiourarén Formation of Niger. With over 95% of its skeleton preserved it is among the most complete sauropods ever found.
Jobaria was a primitive sauropod, about 18.2 meters (60 ft) long and estimated to weigh about 24 tons. Its backbone and tail were simple compared to the complex vertebrae and whiplash tail of the later North America sauropods Diplodocus and Apatosaurus.
It may also have been able to rear up on its hind legs as Paul Sereno concluded, after comparing the ratios of humerus and femur circumferences in Jobaria to living elephants. The weight distribution of Jobaria indicates that it was supported by the rear limbs rather than the forelimbs (as in elephants) and is speculated that as elephants can rear up, then Jobaria would have been able to as well and more easily."
