Ceratonykus Ceratonykus
"horned claw"
You 1.8 m (5.9 ft) tall
Ceratonykus 60 cm (2 ft) long
1 person — shorter than 60 cm (2 ft)
- Length
- 60 cm (2 ft)
- Period
- Late Cretaceous (100–66 Mya)
- Place
- Mongolia
- Food
- Carnivore
- Clade
- Alvarezsauridae
Ceratonykus (meaning “horned claw”) is a monospecific genus of alvarezsaurid dinosaur from Mongolia that lived during the Late Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) in what is now the Barun Goyot Formation. The type and only species, Ceratonykus oculatus, is known from a fragmentary skeleton, including an incomplete skull, of an adult individual. It was named and described in 2009 by Vladimir Alifanov and Rinchen Barsbold. Its describers questioned the traditional placement of alvarezsaurs in Theropoda, instead suggesting they were ornithischians, but this has not been accepted since. Ceratonykus has an estimated length of 75 cm and weight of 760 g. It has been considered as a possible junior synonym of Parvicursor.
What we know
- Named by Alifanov & Barsbold, 2009.
- Body length estimated at about 0.6 m.
- Fossils found in Mongolia.