Name:
Wendiceratops
(Wendy’s horn face).
Phonetic: Wen-de-seh-rah-tops.
Named By: David C. Evans & Michael J.
Ryan - 2015.
Classification: Chordata, Reptilia, Dinosauria,
Ornithischia, Marginocephalia, Ceratopsidae, Centrosaurinae.
Species: W. pinhornensis
(type).
Diet: Herbivore.
Size: Roughly estimated to be about 6 meters
long.
Known locations: Canada, Alberta - Oldman
Formation.
Time period: Campanian of the Cretaceous.
Fossil representation: Partial skull and post
cranial skeletal remains from several individuals, including adults
and juveniles. The first remains were found together in a bone bed.
A
very interesting discovery, Wendiceratops has
been identified as one
of the oldest centrosaurine ceratopsian
dinosaurs so far discovered.
At the time of writing only Xenoceratops
and Diabloceratops
are known
to have been older. So far much of what we know about Wendiceratops
has been pieced together by fragmentary and partial remains, but
these do show us interesting developments in the head ornamentation.
Like most ceratopsian genera, Wendiceratops had
large triangular
osteoderms that were attached to the edges of the neck frill,
which are larger as they approached the top. Also, the further up
they went, the more they curved around and down. The nasal horn
also seems to have been fairly low and blunt, yet still quite large
in its development. Brow horns are expected to have been present
above the eyes, but so far no complete horns have been found, so
their size and shape can so far only be guessed at. In comparison to
other ceratopsian dinosaurs, the ornamentation of Wendiceratops
seems
to be most similar to that of Sinoceratops
from China. The discovery
of Wendiceratops has helped to reinforce the idea
that the ceratopsian
dinosaurs were very quickly evolving ever more changing head
ornamentation, most probably to more easily tell one species from the
next.
By
the 2015 naming of Wendiceratops, this genus
is now one of five
separate ceratopsian dinosaur genera that are known from this part of
North America during the Campanian, with the other ceratopsian
dinosaur genera including,
Albertaceratops, Avaceratops,
Judiceratops
and Medusaceratops.
Ceratopsians would have been some
of the principal herbivorous dinosaurs in North America at this
time, though hadrosaurs
would have also been present, with genera
such as Brachylophosaurus,
Corythosaurus
and Parasaurolophus
possibly
sharing the same landscapes as Wendiceratops.
Predatory threats to
all these dinosaurs would have come from the large tyrannosaurs,
specifically genera such as Daspletosaurus.
Smaller predators such
as dromaeosaurs
and troodonts
would have also been common, but
perhaps more of a threat to smaller juveniles.
Wendiceratops
was named in honour of Wendy Sloboda, the fossil hunter who first
discovered the bonebed that the holotype fossils of this dinosaur were
later found in 2010, though most fossils from this location were
not recovered until 2013-2014 after the overburden (the rock and
soil above the deposit) was removed. The species name pinhornensis
simply means that the holotype of the type species of the genus came
from the Pinhorn Provincial Grazing Reserve.
Further reading
- Cranial anatomy of Wendiceratops pinhornensis
gen. et sp.
nov., a centrosaurine ceratopsid (Dinosauria: Ornithischia)
from the Oldman Formation (Campanian), Alberta, Canada, and
the evolution of ceratopsid nasal ornamentation. - PLoS ONE
10(7). - David C. Evans & Michael J. Ryan -
2015.