Saurornitholestes

Saurornitholestes is a genus of carnivorous dromaeosaurid theropod dinosaur from the late Cretaceous of Canada and the United States. Two species have been named that are regarded as valid: Saurornitholestes langstoni in 1978 and Saurornitholestes sullivani in 2015. Saurornitholestes was a small, bipedal, meat-eating dinosaur, equipped with a sickle-like claw on each foot.

Saurornitholestes

Gunnar Bivens · 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
SaurornitholestinaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Dromaeosauridae
Life habit
ground dwellingPBDB, for Dromaeosauridae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Dromaeosauridae
Length
1.8 mWikidata
Mass
10 kgWikidata

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 148 of 148 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 148 occurrences84–83 Mya — about 1 occurrence83–83 Mya — about 6 occurrences83–82 Mya — about 6 occurrences82–82 Mya — about 6 occurrences82–81 Mya — about 6 occurrences81–80 Mya — about 6 occurrences80–80 Mya — about 6 occurrences80–79 Mya — about 6 occurrences79–79 Mya — about 6 occurrences79–78 Mya — about 6 occurrences78–77 Mya — about 6 occurrences77–77 Mya — about 6 occurrences77–76 Mya — about 6 occurrences76–75 Mya — about 6 occurrences75–75 Mya — about 6 occurrences75–74 Mya — about 6 occurrences74–74 Mya — about 6 occurrences74–73 Mya — about 6 occurrences73–72 Mya — about 6 occurrences72–72 Mya — about 4 occurrences72–71 Mya — about 4 occurrences71–70 Mya — about 4 occurrences70–70 Mya — about 4 occurrences70–69 Mya — about 4 occurrences69–69 Mya — about 4 occurrences69–68 Mya — about 4 occurrences68–67 Mya — about 4 occurrences67–67 Mya — about 4 occurrences67–66 Mya — about 4 occurrences66–66 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences84.1 Mya65.5 Mya

148 occurrences of Saurornitholestes 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

148 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

21 formations

Dinosaur Park — 49.12°N, 110.47°WDinosaur Park — 50.75°N, 111.48°WDinosaur Park — 50.74°N, 111.49°WDinosaur Park — 50.79°N, 111.62°WDinosaur Park — 50.75°N, 111.40°WDinosaur Park — 50.78°N, 111.33°WDinosaur Park — 51.44°N, 110.39°WDinosaur Park — 51.47°N, 110.39°WDinosaur Park — 52.45°N, 109.17°WDinosaur Park — 49.07°N, 110.45°WDinosaur Park — 50.76°N, 110.02°WOldman — 50.75°N, 111.51°WOldman — 49.10°N, 110.94°WOldman — 49.08°N, 110.84°WOldman — 49.08°N, 110.68°WOldman — 49.16°N, 110.72°WOldman — 50.83°N, 111.32°WOldman — 49.28°N, 112.58°WOldman — 50.74°N, 111.49°WOldman — 50.75°N, 111.42°WOldman — 50.64°N, 110.91°WOldman — 50.73°N, 110.08°WOldman — 49.28°N, 112.20°WAguja — 29.32°N, 103.52°WAguja — 29.20°N, 103.20°WAguja — 29.10°N, 103.17°WAguja — 29.23°N, 103.57°WFerris — 41.94°N, 106.88°WFerris — 41.80°N, 107.00°WFerris — 41.96°N, 106.89°WHell Creek — 45.95°N, 103.96°WHell Creek — 46.10°N, 103.30°WHell Creek — 45.98°N, 103.75°WHell Creek — 46.41°N, 103.94°WHell Creek — 46.33°N, 103.90°WHell Creek — 47.61°N, 106.90°WHell Creek — 45.66°N, 105.08°WHell Creek — 45.00°N, 103.19°WJudith River — 46.47°N, 109.30°WJudith River — 46.46°N, 109.41°WJudith River — 48.93°N, 110.58°WJudith River — 46.10°N, 109.10°WJudith River — 46.42°N, 109.27°WJudith River — 48.41°N, 106.87°WJavelina — 29.43°N, 103.14°WTwo Medicine — 48.65°N, 112.97°WTwo Medicine — 47.81°N, 112.18°WTwo Medicine — 48.63°N, 113.75°WTwo Medicine — 47.99°N, 112.28°WForemost — 50.07°N, 111.14°WForemost — 49.13°N, 110.87°WKirtland — 36.27°N, 108.17°WKirtland — 36.34°N, 108.08°WSînpetru — 45.55°N, 22.92°EMenefee — 35.70°N, 107.20°WPrince Creek — 69.60°N, 151.80°WUdurchukan — 49.08°N, 130.86°EMesaverde — 42.85°N, 107.28°WHorseshoe Canyon — 53.45°N, 113.55°WMooreville Chalk — 32.92°N, 88.07°WWapiti — 55.25°N, 118.51°WCoachman — 34.24°N, 79.84°WDonoho Creek — 34.06°N, 79.53°WFox Hills — 46.38°N, 99.59°W

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The named rock units Saurornitholestes has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 1 occurrence has no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Saurornitholestes and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

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

Found in the same rock

459 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 140 sites for Saurornitholestes, 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

45 references

Each of the 148 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. 33 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 content2

Picture of Saurornitholestes

Credit
Gunnar Bivens
Licence
CC BY 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

CT scan

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Saurornitholestes langstoni · ualvp:55410

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 itSaurornitholestinae through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Sues 1978