Garudimimus
Name:
Garudimimus
(Garuda mimic).
Phonetic: Gah-ru-di-mime-us.
Named By: Rinchen Barsbold - 1981.
Classification: Chordata, Reptilia, Dinosauria,
Saurischia, Theropoda, Maniraptoriformes, Ornithomimosauria.
Species: G. brevipes (type).
Diet: Uncertain, but usually thought to be an
omnivore.
Size: Estimated around 3.5 to 4 meters long.
Known locations: Mongolia - Bayan Shireh
Formation.
Time period: Cenomanian to Santonian or Turonian to
Campanian of the Cretaceous. At the time of writing there is some
confusion regarding the age of the Bayan Shireh Formation. See main
text for details.
Fossil representation: Skull and partial post
cranial skeleton.
Garudimimus
is considered to be an ornithomimosaur,
but unlike others of its kind
it had shorter ilia, the legs were shorter and the muscles not as
well developed. This has led to speculation that Garudimimus
would
have actually been quite slow for an ornithomimosaur, although it
could still probably out pace a human runner with ease. The feet of
Garudimimus also had four toes rather than the
‘normal’ three of
other ornithomimosaurs. It is uncertain how these features affected
its life, but scleral rings (the bony rings that were within the
eyes) in Garudimimus are of the kind that suggest
it was a cathemeral
dinosaur, active for short periods during both day and night. Early
reconstructions of Garudimimus gave it a short horn
on top of its skull
in front of the eyes, but this has now been discovered to be a
fragment of the skull that had broken loose. For a primitive
ornithomimosaur that really did have a skull crest, see Pelicanimimus.
There
is some confusion
regarding the exact age of the Bayan Shireh Formation which means that
Garudimimus has been credited with living in both
the Cenomanian and
Campanian periods of the late Cretaceous. Magnetostratigraphy of the
Bayan Shireh Formation suggests the earlier estimate, but dinosaurs
known from the formation contradict this. One example is the
tyrannosaur
Alectrosaurus
which is known from this formation but also
has remains from the Iren Dabasu Formation which is seen as Campanian
of the Cretaceous. Assuming that no mistake has been made with the
assignment of this material this would suggest a Campanian time period
for Garudimimus.
Further reading
- Bezzubyye khishchnyye dinozavry Mongolii [Toothless carnivorous
dinosaurs of Mongolia]. - Sovmestnaia Sovetsko-Mongol’skaia
Paleontologicheskaia Ekspeditsiia Trudy 15:28-39. - R. Barsbold - 1981.
- Reexamination of a primitive ornithomimosaur, Garudimimus
brevipes
Barsbold, 1981 (Dinosauria:Theropoda), from the Late Cretaceous of
Mongolia. - Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, 42: 1501–1521. - Y.
Kobayashi & R. Barsbold - 2005.
-
Retrodeformation and muscular reconstruction of ornithomimosaurian
dinosaur crania. - PeerJ. 3: e1093. - A. R. Cuff & E. J.
Rayfield -
2015.
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