Brachiosaurus

Brachiosaurus is a genus of sauropod dinosaur that lived in North America during the Late Jurassic, about 155.6 to 145.5 million years ago. It was first described by American paleontologist Elmer S. Riggs in 1903 from fossils found in the Colorado River valley in western Colorado, United States. Riggs named the dinosaur Brachiosaurus altithorax; the generic name is Greek for "arm lizard", in reference to its proportionately long arms, and the specific name means "deep chest". Brachiosaurus is estimated to have been between 18 and 22 meters long; body mass estimates of the subadult holotype specimen range from 28.3 to 46.9 metric tons. It had a disproportionately long neck, small skull, and large overall size, all of which are typical for sauropods. Atypically, Brachiosaurus had longer forelimbs than hindlimbs, which resulted in a steeply inclined trunk, and a proportionally shorter tail.

A picture published with the record for Brachiosaurus.

Matt Wedel · CC BY 3.0 · 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
BrachiosauridaePBDB
Diet
herbivorePBDB, for Sauropoda
Life habit
ground dwelling, gregariousPBDB, for Sauropoda
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Sauropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Sauropoda
Length
30 mWikidata
Mass
58 tonneWikidata

Time the record covers

At least 3 million years on record.

The record covers at least 152.21 Mya to 149.2 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 157.9 Mya to 143.1 Mya.

Late Jurassic — about 20 of 20 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 0 of 20 occurrences158–158 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences158–157 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences157–157 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences157–156 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences156–156 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences156–155 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences155–155 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences155–154 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences154–154 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences154–153 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences153–153 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences153–152 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences152–152 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences152–151 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences151–151 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences151–150 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences150–149 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences149–149 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences149–148 Mya — about 1 occurrence148–148 Mya — about 1 occurrence148–147 Mya — about 1 occurrence147–147 Mya — about 1 occurrence147–146 Mya — about 1 occurrence146–146 Mya — about 1 occurrence146–145 Mya — about 1 occurrence145–145 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences145–144 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences144–144 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences144–143 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences143–143 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences152.21 Mya149.2 Mya158.4 Mya142.6 Mya

20 occurrences of Brachiosaurus on record, most of them in the Late Jurassic. 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

20 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

4 formations

Morrison — 41.91°N, 105.96°WMorrison — 38.54°N, 105.22°WMorrison — 44.65°N, 107.82°WMorrison — 38.64°N, 108.19°WMorrison — 36.90°N, 102.83°WMorrison — 39.07°N, 108.65°WMorrison — 39.08°N, 108.65°WMorrison — 42.02°N, 106.05°WMorrison — 39.15°N, 108.77°WMorrison — 40.41°N, 109.22°WMorrison — 44.05°N, 107.46°WMorrison — 38.25°N, 110.81°WMorrison — 44.06°N, 106.72°WMorrison — 39.14°N, 109.02°WMorrison — 38.58°N, 108.40°WTendaguru — 9.71°S, 39.23°EKadzi — 16.27°S, 30.80°ESüntel — 52.29°N, 8.71°E

Loading coastlines…

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

Brachiosaurus and its relatives

Late Jurassic

Where Brachiosaurus and its relatives were recorded in the Late Jurassic.

Found in the same rock

137 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 19 sites for Brachiosaurus, 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

18 references

Each of the 20 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. 6 further references are not listed. 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 content3

Picture of Brachiosaurus

Credit
Matt Wedel
Licence
CC BY 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

Photogrammetry

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Brachiosaurus brancai · zmb:MB R:MB.R.3736.25

3D model

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

This entry was cached before the site began recording what Smithsonian Open Access did, so a search that failed cannot be told from one that found nothing.

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 itBrachiosauridae through timeFormations of the Late JurassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Riggs 1903