Ichthyovenator
Ichthyovenator is a genus of spinosaurid dinosaur that lived in what is now Laos, sometime between 125 and 113 million years ago. The generic name, meaning ‘fish hunter’, refers to its assumed piscivorous lifestyle, while the specific name alludes to the country of Laos. The holotype specimen is estimated to have been between 8. 5 to 10. 5 metres long and weighed 2. 4 tonnes.
About Ichthyovenator in brief
Ichthyovenator is a genus of spinosaurid dinosaur that lived in what is now Laos, sometime between 125 and 113 million years ago. It is known from fossils collected from the Grès supérieurs Formation of the Savannakhet Basin, the first of which were found in 2010. The generic name, meaning ‘fish hunter’, refers to its assumed piscivorous lifestyle, while the specific name alludes to the country of Laos. The holotype specimen is estimated to have been between 8. 5 to 10. 5 metres long and weighed 2. 4 tonnes. Like others in its family, IchthyoVENator had tall neural spines that formed a sail on its back. It was initially thought to belong to the subfamily Baryonychinae but more recent analyses place it as a primitive member of the Spinosaurinae. It lived alongside sauropod and ornithopod dinosaurs, as well as bivalves, fish and turtles. The latter may represent the same animal as Siamosaurus fusuiensis in 2009; In 2014, Allain indicated the animal may be the same as the Chinese species Siamaurus fiamerus in 1986 and the Thai Siamosaurus in 1986. The fossilized bones were recovered from a red sandstone layer within a surface area of less than 2 square metres. They consist of a partly articulated, well-preserved skeleton lacking the skull and limbs, and including the third-to-last dorsal vertebra, the neural spine of the last dorsal vertebra and five partial sacral vertebrae.
The vertebral spines of the tail were unusually tall, suggesting—as in today’s crocodilians—the tail may have aided in swimming. The pelvic girdle was reduced; the illium—the uppermost body of the pelvis—was proportionately longer than both the pubis and ischium than in other known theropod dinosaurs. The centra of the sacrals are largely incomplete due to erosion, but preserved all of their accompanying spines with their upper edges intact. After undergoing preparation in 2011, the skeleton was used as the basis, or holotype, for the type species Ichth yovenator laosensis, which was named and described in 2012 by palaeontologists Ronan Allain, Tiengkham Xeng, Philippe Khentsouir, and Bounavong. In 2014 it was announced that more remains from the dig site had been recovered; these fossils include teeth, more vertebraes and a pubic bone from the same individual. It’s the third spinosauroid dinosaur from Asia named after the genus Siamosaurus and the species Siniosaurus in 1986 and 1986. Its diet likely mainly consisted of aquatic prey, hence its etymology. It would have had a long, shallow snout and robust forelimbs. It may have been used for sexual display or species recognition.
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This page is based on the article Ichthyovenator published in Wikipedia (as of Nov. 06, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
