fossil_digger Report This Comment Date: June 05, 2007 05:27AM
This real three dimensional Dinosaur is of Museum quality. All of the
fossilized bones are real and belonging. They were all carefully and
painstakingly chiseled out of the surrounding Matrix and mounted together by
professional paleontologist, preserving the anatomical position and
inter-relation with extreme accuracy. A superb masterpiece specimen at a
reasonable price, mounted on a quality wooden stand. A similarly articulated
specimen of Tyranosaurus Rex sold in the US last year for millions of dollars.
The species of this Dinosaur is Psittacosaurus Xingjiangensis and originates
from the Cretaceous Period: It is over 65 million years old. Size: 13.5 inches
high at the hip.
35 inches long. Originally found in Inner Mongolia. Ex English private
collection. This Dinosaur was a gazelle sized bipetal herbivore about 2m long.
It had a high powerful beak on the upper jaw, and vestigial forelimbs probably
seldomly used for walking. It also had quill-like structures on its tail and
lower back, used for display. Fossils from 150 such dinosaurs have been hitherto
collected, including a small number of complete ones, such as this one.
Psittacosaurus was named by the President of the American Museum of Natural
History (AMNH) - Henry Fairfield Osborn - in 1923. The parrot-like beak of these
animals and their reptilian nature, earned them the Greek name Psittacosaurus,
which means "parrot like lizard".
Psittacosaurus was a herbivore, eating plants. It had self sharpening teeth for
cropping and slicing tough plant material. It could not however grind or chew
food; like some modern birds, it relied on astroliths - swallowed stones - to
instigate the initial stages of digestion. Around 50 such stones have been found
in the stomachs of some specimens. A juvenile Psittacosaurus in the AMNH
measures 5 inches long. At 3 years old the animal weighed about 1 kg; at 9 years
of age it weighed around 20 kg. An adult specimen found in the Liaoning Province
of China, was associated with 34 articulated juvenile skeletons, probably not
all belonging to the same mother. It has been speculated that these dinosaurs
may have been engaged in communal nesting, a bit like some ostriches today.
There is little doubt that this relatively small herbivorous dinosaur acted as
prey for other larger carnivorous creatures of this period. Another Chinese
fossil of Repenomanus giganticus, a large cat-like carnivore, has been found
preserved with the remains of a juvenile Psittacosaurus in its abdominal cavity.
Price: $9,900.00
Onyma Report This Comment Date: June 05, 2007 10:27AM
Very nice. Doesn't look a day over 64 million.