Aniksosaurus
Name:
Aniksosaurus
(Spring lizard).
Phonetic: Ah-nik-o-sore-us.
Named By: Ruben Dario Martinez and Fernando Emilio
Novas - 2006.
Classification: Chordata, Reptilia, Dinosauria,
Saurischia, Theropoda, Coelurosauria.
Species: A. darwini (type).
Diet: Carnivore.
Size: Roughly estimated to be about 2 and 3
meters long.
Known locations: Argentina, Chubut Province -
Bajo Barreal Formation.
Time period: Cenomanian/Turonian of the Cretaceous.
Fossil representation: Articulated right hind limb.
Remains of further remains known.
Aniksosaurus
was a small coelurosaur from South America, and one that may have
lived in small groups. Evidence for this comes from a bone bed of
fossils that so far only contain Aniksosaurus.
These however may be
sub adults, which could also be interpreted as a group of young
Aniksosaurus sticking together for protection, but
possibly splitting
up in later life. This again however raises the notion of pack
hunting in dinosaurs, a controversial theory, but one that is
slowly seeming more possible as more and more predator genus specific
bone beds are located.
Aniksosaurus
was once thought to have grown up to two meters long, but now revised
estimates suggest that it may have grown somewhere between two and
three meters long. As a small coelurosaur, Aniksosaurus
probably
hunted small vertebrates like lizards as well as smaller, possibly
juvenile dinosaurs. However, if Aniksosaurus
moved and hunted in
groups, they could have feasibly taken on larger prey. However,
even in this scenario Aniksosaurus would have had
to be careful of
larger predators.
Aniksosaurus
is known from the Bajo Barreal Formation which means that it probably
shared its habitat with hadrosaurs
like Secernosaurus
and sauropods
like Campylodoniscus,
Drusilasaura
and Epachthosaurus.
One
predatory threat that Aniksosaurus would have to be
very careful of is
the abelisaur
Xenotarsosaurus.
Abeilsaurs were
not the only other
predators around in the same ecosystem as the teeth of dromaeosaurs
and
carcharodontosaurs
are also known in this formation. The
carcharodontosaurid connection is of particular interest here since the
large predators Giganotosaurus
and Mapusaurus
are known to have been
roaming South America at the same time as Aniksosaurus.
Further reading
- Aniksosaurus darwini gen. et sp. nov., a
new coelurosaurian
theropod from the early Late Cretaceous of central Patagonia,
Argentina, Ruben Dario Martinez and Fernando Emilio Novas - 2006.
- The Behavioral Implications of a Multi-Individual Bonebed of a
Small Theropod Dinosaur, L. M. Ibiricu, R. N. D.
Martinez, G. A. Casal & I. A. Cerda - 2013.
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