Yangchuanosaurus

Yangchuanosaurus is an extinct genus of metriacanthosaurid theropod dinosaur that lived in China from the Middle Jurassic to Late Jurassic periods, and was similar in size and appearance to its North American and European relative, Allosaurus. Yangchuanosaurus hails from the Upper Shaximiao Formation and was the largest predator in a landscape that included the sauropods Mamenchisaurus and Omeisaurus and the stegosaurs Chialingosaurus, Tuojiangosaurus and Chungkingosaurus. This theropod was named after the area in which was discovered, Yongchuan, in China.

Yangchuanosaurus

Laikayiu · 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
MetriacanthosauridaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Theropoda
Life habit
ground dwelling, solitaryPBDB, for Theropoda
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Theropoda
Length
10 mWikidata

Time the record covers

At least 41 million years on record.

The record covers at least 161.5 Mya to 119.57 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 170.9 Mya to 113.2 Mya.

Middle Jurassic — about 3 of 4 occurrencesMiddle JurassicLate Jurassic — about 0 of 4 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 1 of 4 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous172–170 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences170–168 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences168–166 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences166–164 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences164–162 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences162–160 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences160–158 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences158–156 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences156–154 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences120–118 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences118–116 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences116–114 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences114–112 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences161.5 Mya119.57 Mya172 Mya112 Mya

4 occurrences of Yangchuanosaurus on record. 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

2 formations

Shaximiao — 29.41°N, 104.85°EShaximiao — 29.33°N, 105.68°ESuining — 30.15°N, 105.30°E

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

Found in the same rock

39 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 4 sites for Yangchuanosaurus, 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

4 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 Yangchuanosaurus

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

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Credit
PaleoMari
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 itMetriacanthosauridae through timeThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Dong et al. 1978