Saltasaurus

What it was like

Saltasaurus was a sauropod, but a small one by sauropod standards, growing to about 12 meters (39 feet) long, with a short neck and stubby legs. What set it apart was its skin: bony plates called osteoderms, some as big as a fist, were embedded across its back. It was the first sauropod genus found with this kind of armor, and paleontologists have since found similar plates on other titanosaurs.

Like other titanosaurs, it walked on four thick legs and carried a long tail. Its skull was small and its teeth were simple, suited to stripping leaves rather than chewing them, a common feeding style among sauropods.

Its world

Saltasaurus lived from about 72 to 66 million years ago, in the final stretch of the Late Cretaceous, in what is now Argentina. Its bones come from the Lecho Formation.

It shared its habitat with the small predator Noasaurus and the fellow titanosaur Neuquensaurus, and its close relatives include Alamosaurus in North America and Opisthocoelicaudia in Asia.

How it was found

Bonaparte and Powell named Saltasaurus in 1980, from bones found in Argentina. It is known from a single find, but that discovery mattered: bony armor had never before been confirmed on a sauropod. The osteoderms found with Saltasaurus changed how paleontologists pictured titanosaur skin, since armor of this kind has since turned up on several of its relatives.