Pachyrhinosaurus

Pachyrhinosaurus is a genus of centrosaurine ceratopsid dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous period of North America. The first examples were discovered by Charles M. Sternberg in Alberta, Canada, in 1946, and named in 1950. Over a dozen partial skulls and a large assortment of other fossils from various species have been found in Alberta and Alaska. A great number were not available for study until the 1980s, resulting in a relatively recent increase of interest in Pachyrhinosaurus.

Pachyrhinosaurus

Etemenanki3 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
PachyrhinosauriniPBDB
Diet
herbivorePBDB, for Ceratopsia
Life habit
ground dwellingPBDB, for Ceratopsia
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Ornithischia
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Ceratopsia
Length
8 mWikidata
Mass
4 tonneWikidata

Time the record covers

At most 18 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 83.6 Mya and 66 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Late Cretaceous — about 16 of 16 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 16 occurrences84–83 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences83–83 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences83–82 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences82–82 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences82–81 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences81–80 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences80–80 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences80–79 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences79–79 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences79–78 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences78–77 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences77–77 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences77–76 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences76–75 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences75–75 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences75–74 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences74–74 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences74–73 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences73–72 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences72–72 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences72–71 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences71–70 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences70–70 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences70–69 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences69–69 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences69–68 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences68–67 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences67–67 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences67–66 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences66–66 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences84.1 Mya65.5 Mya

16 occurrences of Pachyrhinosaurus on record, most of them in the Late Cretaceous. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

16 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

5 formations

Horseshoe Canyon — 51.55°N, 112.87°WHorseshoe Canyon — 51.41°N, 112.63°WHorseshoe Canyon — 51.55°N, 112.88°WWapiti — 55.06°N, 119.11°WWapiti — 55.07°N, 119.55°WWapiti — 55.02°N, 119.43°WWapiti — 54.98°N, 119.56°WSt. Mary River — 49.92°N, 112.99°WSt. Mary River — 50.19°N, 113.01°WPrince Creek — 69.83°N, 151.52°WPrince Creek — 70.01°N, 151.54°WSummit Creek — 64.56°N, 125.83°W

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Pachyrhinosaurus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Pachyrhinosaurus and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

Where Pachyrhinosaurus and its relatives were recorded in the Late Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

72 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 15 sites for Pachyrhinosaurus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

10 references

Each of the 16 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Pachyrhinosaurus

Credit
Etemenanki3
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Credit
Tim
Licence
CC Attribution
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itPachyrhinosaurini through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Sternberg 1950