Dinosaurs are mostly known for their meat-eating habits, but did you know that many of them were herbivores too?
Herbivore dinosaurs ate plants, including leaves, flowers, fruit and stems. They also had teeth that were ideal for grabbing and grinding vegetation.
Giraffatitan
The herbivore dinosaur Giraffatitan lived more than 150 million years ago during the Jurassic Period in parts of Africa. It was originally mistook for Brachiosaurus brancai by the first scientists who studied it, and it is still debated whether or not the two species are truly separate.
This gigantic, giraffe-like dinosaur belonged to a group of sauropods, or large, long-necked plant-eating dinosaurs that included Diplodocus. It could use its long neck to reach tree tops without having to lift a foot off the ground.
It also walked on all four legs and weighed about 30 short tons. It was considered to be one of the biggest dinosaurs that ever existed.
Like other sauropods, it had chisel-shaped front teeth that helped it eat from the top of Jurassic trees. But it had no back teeth for chewing its food, so it would swallow clumps of leaves whole.
These enormous dinosaurs lived in the Tendaguru Formation in Tanzania (Africa) during the Late Jurassic Period. They weighed as much as six elephants and were about 70 feet (21 meters) long from head to tail.
When paleontologists compared the fossils of this dinosaur to those of Brachiosaurus, they noticed that the African form was different from its North American counterpart. This led to a debate over whether or not it should be placed in its own genus. In 1991, George Olshevsky affirmed that the differences were enough to place this dinosaur in its own genus, Giraffatitan.
Mamenchisaurus
Mamenchisaurus was a herbivore dinosaur, which means it only ate plants. It had a long neck, so it could feast on leaves up high in trees.
It is a member of the family Euhelopodidae and was found in China. It is one of the longest-necked sauropods, with a neck that measured 13 to 15 meters (43 to 49 feet) in length.
The genus was named in 1954 by Chung Chien Young, a Chinese paleontologist. It was first discovered in 1952 on a construction site near Sichuan.
Researchers now think the long neck helped the animal poke into forests and eat plants that large sauropods couldn’t eat, such as horsetails, club mosses and ferns. The long neck also allowed it to feed on pteridophytes, which are soft-leaved plants.
This explains why Mamenchisaurus is the largest herbivore dinosaur. It would have eaten a huge amount of plant material each day to survive.
This giant herbivore lived around 150 million years ago and was a member of the Euhelopodidae, which is a group of sauropods that ruled the earth during the Jurassic Period. It had one of the longest necks of any known dinosaur. It was also a good hunter, able to swallow large quantities of food whole.
Micropachycephalosaurus
Micropachycephalosaurus was a herbivore dinosaur that lived during the Late Cretaceous period. The name of this genus is derived from the term “micro- + pachycephalosaurus”, which means “small thick-headed lizard”.
Micropachycephalosaurus were found in China during the Late Cretaceous and characterized by their small, thick-headed skulls. They were a member of the family Pachycephalosauridae and were originally described by Dong Zhiming in 1978.
Paleontologists Butler and Zhao re-examined this fossil in 2008, using modern methods to identify its characteristics. They were unable to find any similarities between this specimen and the pachycephalosaurs, which means that Micropachycephalosaurus may not have been a member of the Pachycephalosauridae at all.
They also failed to confirm the presence of a skull roof, one of the key characteristics that would help identify pachycephalosaurs. As a result, they classified this species as an indeterminate member of the Cerapoda order.
These herbivores were extremely agile and could run fast. They were able to do this due to their light weight and small size. Their speed made them ideal for surviving in mixed environments such as woodlands, grasslands and wetlands.
Oryctodromeus
Oryctodromeus is a herbivore dinosaur that lived in the Cretaceous period and inhabited North America. Fossils of this dinosaur have been found in places such as Idaho and Montana.
Oryctodromeus was a member of the Hypsilophodont family. It is the first known dinosaur to show evidence of burrowing behavior.
This small, herbivorous dinosaur was found in southeastern Idaho in the Wayan formation, and in southwestern Montana in the Blackleaf formation. It lived 95 million years ago during the middle Cretaceous period.
The fossils of Oryctodromeus include a two-meter long burrow filled with sediment. This is important because it proves that some dinosaurs adapted to the burrowing lifestyle and were able to survive in harsh environments.
These herbivores were able to live in their burrows for a very long time. They had a slender pelvis, strong arms and sturdy shoulders that they could use to dig underground.
They also had a flexible tail that they used to push soil and help them move through their burrows. This helped them in the digging process and made it easier for them to survive in harsh environments.
Oryctodromeus was able to survive in harsh conditions and escape predators that were lurking around them. Their slender pelvis and strong forearms were also useful in grabbing and holding onto the soil to make their burrows deeper.
Liaoceratops
In the Barremian epoch of the Early Cretaceous, a small herbivore dinosaur called Liaoceratops lived in China. It walked along trails in a subtropical to temperate forest, eating ferns and cycads.
The earliest known basal member of the ceratopsian dinosaur family, it had horns and a frill on its skull. This frill allowed it to withstand the hard chewing of tough vegetation.
But what really makes this herbivore special is that it has small horns opposite sideways under each of its eyes, which may have been used for species recognition and mating. They could have also been used as display organs.
Its front legs were longer than other sauropods, so it leaned forward and had a more giraffe-like posture. This also allowed it to reach the roots of cycads and other plants that its prey, birds, couldn’t get to.
Liaoceratops was a member of the neoceratopsian group of dinosaurs, which includes Triceratops and Archaeoceratops. It lived around 130 million years ago in the Yixian Formation of China.
Parkososaurus
Herbivore dinosaurs were the most common types of dinosaurs to live on Earth. They specialised in what they ate, which allowed them to survive and diversify.
Herbivorous dinosaurs ate plants, trees and other herbaceous foods. Plants were more nutritious and provided food that was easily digested, unlike meat. This meant that they could survive on their own for long periods of time without having to prey on other animals like carnivorous dinosaurs.
Parksosaurus is an herbivore dinosaur that lived in the Cretaceous period and inhabited North America. It is known for its physical look based off of fossils that depict a partial skull and partial skeleton.
It was also known for its front legs which were longer than other sauropods. This made it resemble a giraffe and its neck was pointed up, resulting in a squat posture.
It is believed to have lived around 70 million years ago. It was a small, bipedal herbivore dinosaur and is part of the genus Hypsilophodon. It was named after paleontologist William Parks who first discovered it in 1937.
Psittacosaurus
Psittacosaurus is a genus of herbivore dinosaurs, which means they ate plants. This group of dinosaurs has a large number of species and has been discovered in fossil deposits throughout Asia.
These dinosaurs were found throughout China, Mongolia and Siberia during the Early Cretaceous period. They were about 8 feet long (2.4 meters) and weighed about 175 pounds (79 kilograms).
This herbivore had sharp, self-sharpening teeth that would have been useful for cropping plant material. However, they had no teeth suitable for chewing or grinding their food like some other ceratopsians did.
Instead, they used gastrolith stones to wear down their food as it went through their digestive system. These stones were similar to those found in modern birds, which store them in a gizzard.
In addition, this dinosaur had a parrot-like beak with a sheat cover of keratin. This allowed it to cut through plant materials without damaging the material itself.
This herbivore was one of the earliest species of ceratopsians and was a member of the Ceratopsia family. This family includes dinosaurs with neck frills and horns. Some of these dinosaurs, like Psittacosaurus, have a sheat cover on their beaks that allows them to cut through plant material.