Daspletosaurus

What it was like

Daspletosaurus was a heavily built tyrannosaurid, a close relative of Tyrannosaurus, and grew to about 9 meters (30 feet) long. Like other tyrannosaurids it walked on two legs, had a massive skull full of thick, sharp teeth, and carried small arms that looked out of proportion to the rest of its body.

It was an apex predator in its ecosystem, likely hunting large plant eaters such as the horned and duck-billed dinosaurs that shared its world.

Its world

Daspletosaurus lived from about 84 to 72 million years ago, during the Late Cretaceous, across what is now Alberta, Montana, New Mexico, and Wyoming in North America. Its fossils come from rock layers including the Two Medicine, Oldman, Dinosaur Park, Judith River, Kirtland, and Mesaverde formations.

It shared its habitat with the plant eaters Corythosaurus, Euoplocephalus, and Stegoceras, the small hunters Saurornitholestes, Richardoestesia, and Paronychodon, the troodontid Troodon, and in some areas the tyrannosaurid Gorgosaurus.

How it was found

Russell named Daspletosaurus in 1970. About 18 fossil finds of this genus are known today, a modest number that still leaves researchers debating how many species belong to the genus and how it relates to close relatives like Tarbosaurus and Albertosaurus.