- Leaellynasaura
Taxobox
name = "Leaellynasaura"
fossil_range =Early Cretaceous
regnum =Animal ia
phylum = Chordata
classis = Sauropsida
superordo =Dinosaur ia
ordo =Ornithischia
subordo =Cerapoda
infraordo =Ornithopoda
familia =Hypsilophodont idae
genus = "Leaellynasaura"
binomial = "Leaellynasaura amicagraphica"
binomial_authority = Rich & Rich, 1989"Leaellynasaura" was a small
herbivorous ornithopod dinosaur of about 60-90 cm in length from the earliestCretaceous , first discovered inDinosaur Cove ,Australia . Strangely enough, at this period in time, Victoria would have been well within theAntarctic Circle , which is now very cold. This means that "Leaellynasaura" was living and apparently thriving much further south than anyreptile could today. This is particularly relevant due to "Cryolophosaurus " being discovered inAntarctica , thus further suggesting the idea that dinosaurs could live under conditions which were once thought unsuitable for their kind. It is possible that the sun would not have risen for several weeks or months in the winter, depending onlatitude , which means that "Leaellynasaura" would have had to live in the dark for perhaps months at a time. This is particularly relevant to the fact that "Leaellynosaura" had very bigeye s and its brain had largeoptic lobe s, as if it had evolved to be routinely active in the dark. Regardless, the fact that it lived in extremely cold temperatures led many scientists to believe that "Leaellynasaura" waswarm-blooded .The type species is "Leaellynasaura amicagraphica". It was described in
1989 . It was named afterLeaellyn Rich , the daughter of the palaeontologist coupleTom Rich andPatricia Vickers-Rich who discovered it. "Leaellynasaura" was ahypsilophodont , a rather basalornithopod . Like all ornithopods, it was aherbivore .No complete skeletons have been found of "Leaellynasaura". It stood at about one metre (3 feet).
In popular culture
"Leaellynasaura" appeared on the fifth episode of "
Walking with Dinosaurs ".Evolved cold-weather "Leaellynasaura" appeared in Stephen Baxter's "Evolution" in the chapter "The Last Burrow."
References
* http://www.users.qwest.net/~jstweet1/ornithopoda.htm
* Rich, T. and Rich, P. , 1988, “Polar dinosaurs and biotas of the Early Cretaceous of southeastern Australia”, National Geographic Research, 5(1) 1989, 15-53 (1988).
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