Wuerhosaurus

Taxobox
name = "Wuerhosaurus"
fossil_range = Early Cretaceous

---

regnum = Animalia
phylum = Chordata
classis = Sauropsida
superordo = Dinosauria
ordo = Ornithischia
subordo = Thyreophora
infraordo = Stegosauria
familia = Stegosauridae
genus = "Wuerhosaurus"
genus_authority = Dong, 1973
subdivision_ranks=Species
subdivision=
*"W. homheni" Dong, 1973 (type
*"W. ordosensis" Dong, 1993

"Wuerhosaurus" is a genus of stegosaurid dinosaur from the Early Cretaceous Period of China. It was roughly 7 metres long (23 ft).

Discovery and species

"Wuerhosaurus homheni" is the type species, described by Dong Zhiming in 1973 from the Tugulu Group in Xinjiang, western China. A smaller species from the Ejinhoro Formation in the Ordos Basin in Inner Mongolia, "W. ordosensis", was formalized by the same researcher in 1993.

Paleobiology

It was lower to the ground than most other stegosaurids; scientists believe that this was an adaptation to let it feed on low-growing vegetation. Unlike "Stegosaurus", "Wuerhosaurus" had shorter, rounded plates, whose purpose is debated. "Wuerhosaurus", like other stegosaurids, had a thagomizer on the end of its tail, which featured four bony spikes that would most likely have been used for self-defense.

References

*

External links

* [http://www.users.qwest.net/~jstweet1/stegosauria.htm "Wuerhosaurus"] at "Thescelosaurus"!