Cairanoolithus

Cairanoolithus is an oogenus of dinosaur egg which is found in Southwestern Europe. The eggs are large and spherical. Their outer surface is either smooth, or covered with a subdued pattern of ridges interspersed with pits and grooves. Multiple fossil egg clutches are known but the nest structure is unclear.

Cairanoolithus

Ghedoghedo · CC BY-SA 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
CairanoolithidaePBDB
Diet
herbivorePBDB, for Ornithischia
Life habit
ground dwelling, gregariousPBDB, for Ornithischia
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Ornithischia
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Ornithischia

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 17 of 17 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 17 occurrences84–83 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences83–83 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences83–82 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences82–82 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences82–81 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences81–80 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 occurrences78–77 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences77–77 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences77–76 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences76–75 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 occurrences73–72 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences72–72 Mya — about 1 occurrence72–71 Mya — about 2 occurrences71–70 Mya — about 2 occurrences70–70 Mya — about 2 occurrences70–69 Mya — about 2 occurrences69–69 Mya — about 2 occurrences69–68 Mya — about 2 occurrences68–67 Mya — about 2 occurrences67–67 Mya — about 2 occurrences67–66 Mya — about 2 occurrences66–66 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences84.1 Mya65.5 Mya

17 occurrences of Cairanoolithus 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

17 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

Marnes Rouges Inférieures — 42.93°N, 2.26°EGrès à Reptiles — 43.60°N, 6.11°ELa Posa — 42.17°N, 1.25°EGrey Garumnian — 42.17°N, 1.24°EGrès de Labarre — 43.09°N, 1.37°E

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The named rock units Cairanoolithus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 9 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Cairanoolithus and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

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

Found in the same rock

28 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 16 sites for Cairanoolithus, 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

8 references

Each of the 17 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 content1

Picture of Cairanoolithus

Credit
Ghedoghedo
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Cairanoolithus was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access was 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 itCairanoolithidae through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Vianey-Liaud et al. 1994