Tarbosaurus bataar TAR-bo-SOR-us
"Alarming lizard"
You 1.8 m (5.9 ft) tall
Tarbosaurus 10 m (33 ft) long
6 people holding hands
- Length
- 10 m (33 ft) — About 10 m long, ~5 tonnes — the Asian counterpart to T. rex.
- Period
- Late Cretaceous (70–66 Mya)
- Place
- Asia · Mongolia · China
- Food
- Carnivore — Large prey, especially hadrosaurs like Saurolophus that shared its territory.
Tarbosaurus was the Asian cousin of Tyrannosaurus rex, hunting across Mongolia and China at the same time T. rex ruled North America. The two genera are so similar that paleontologists still argue whether they should be separate at all, or just one widespread tyrannosaur split between continents.
What we know
- More than 30 skeletons known, mostly from the Nemegt Formation of Mongolia.
- Skull was lighter and lower than T. rex but still packed with banana-sized teeth.
- Tiny two-fingered arms, like T. rex.
- Lived alongside Therizinosaurus, Gallimimus, and Deinocheirus.
What we guess
- Whether Tarbosaurus and T. rex are separate genera or two species of the same animal — anatomists are split.
- How it competed with the giant ostrich-like Deinocheirus, which lived in the same swampy delta.
- Whether juveniles hunted differently from adults, as T. rex juveniles seem to have.