Tsintaosaurus

Tsintaosaurus is a genus of hadrosaurid dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous of China. It was about 8.3 metres (27 ft) long and weighed 2.5 tonnes. The type species is Tsintaosaurus spinorhinus, first described by Chinese paleontologist C. C. Young in 1958. As a hadrosaur, Tsintaosaurus had the characteristic 'duck bill' snout and a battery of powerful teeth which it used to chew vegetation. It usually walked on all fours, but could rear up on its hind legs to scout for predators and flee when it spotted one. Like other hadrosaurs, Tsintaosaurus probably lived and traveled in herds.

Tsintaosaurus

Albert Prieto-Márquez, Jonathan R. Wagner · CC BY 2.5 · 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
LambeosaurinaePBDB
Diet
herbivorePBDB, for Ornithopoda
Life habit
ground dwelling, gregariousPBDB, for Ornithischia
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Ornithischia
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Ornithischia
Length
12 mWikidata

Time the record covers

At most 12 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 83.6 Mya and 72.2 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Late Cretaceous — about 4 of 4 occurrencesLate Cretaceous84–83 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences83–83 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences83–82 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences82–82 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences82–82 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences82–81 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences81–81 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences81–80 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences80–80 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences80–80 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences80–79 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences79–79 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences79–78 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences78–78 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences78–77 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences77–77 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences77–77 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences77–76 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences76–76 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences76–75 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences75–75 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences75–75 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences75–74 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences74–74 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences74–73 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences73–73 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences73–73 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences73–72 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences84.1 Mya71.7 Mya

4 occurrences of Tsintaosaurus 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

4 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

1 formation

Jingangkou — 36.89°N, 120.66°E

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

Tsintaosaurus and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

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

Found in the same rock

9 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 3 sites for Tsintaosaurus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too.

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

2 references

Each of the 4 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. Each entry links to the Paleobiology Database's own record for the work.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Tsintaosaurus

Credit
Albert Prieto-Márquez, Jonathan R. Wagner
Licence
CC BY 2.5
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

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

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

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 itLambeosaurinae through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Young 1958