Dinosaurs / Cretaceous / Venenosaurus
Venenosaurus
Cretaceous veh-NEN-oh-SAWR-us, “poison lizard”
Venenosaurus was a relatively small sauropod from the Early Cretaceous of eastern Utah, preserved within the Poison Strip Member of the Cedar Mountain Formation. Its genus name translates directly to poison lizard, honouring its geographic locality. Known from partial adult and juvenile skeletons, Venenosaurus was classified as a brachiosaurid due to distinct features in its vertebrae and slender forelimb proportions. Unlike its colossal Jurassic relative Brachiosaurus, Venenosaurus reached only about ten metres in length, demonstrating that sauropods of various sizes populated Early Cretaceous North America. Its elevated shoulders and posture enabled high browsing on branches and seed cones that lower-slung herbivores could not reach. It coexisted with armoured polacanthids and predatory dromaeosaurs, contributing valuable evidence regarding the mid-Mesozoic faunal transition across the continent.
Its name refers to the Poison Strip Member of the Cedar Mountain Formation where its bones were discovered.
Where and when
Venenosaurus lived in the Early Cretaceous, from 125 to 113 million years ago (Aptian age). Its remains come from United States, in the Cedar Mountain Formation.
The numbers
Length 10 m (estimates run from 9 to 11 m). Mass about 4.2 t. Hip height about 2.5 m. That is 5.9 human-lengths, or 0.89 of a double-decker bus. These are estimates from partial skeleton; fields marked estimated by the site are length, mass, hip height.