Dinosaurs A to Z
Brachiosauridae

Venenosaurus ve-nenoʊ-SƆːRUHS

Generic sauropod body-plan outline
You 1.8 m (5.9 ft) tall
Venenosaurus 12 m (39 ft) long
as long as 7 people standing fingertip to fingertip
generic sauropod body plan, scaled to length — not a silhouette of Venenosaurus
Length
12 m (39 ft)
Period
Early Cretaceous (112 Mya)
Place
Utah, USA
Food
Herbivore
Clade
Brachiosauridae Dinosauria Saurischia Sauropodomorpha Sauropoda Giraffe-postured sauropods with long front legs.

Venenosaurus ( ) is a genus of sauropod dinosaur that lived in what is now Utah during the Early Cretaceous. Its type and only species is Venenosaurus dicrocei. Fossils of Venenosaurus were first discovered in 1998, by Denver Museum of Natural History volunteer Anthony DiCroce, and described as a new genus and species in 2001 by Virginia Tidwell and colleagues, who named the species for DiCroce. Venenosaurus was a relatively small sauropod, and was similar to Cedarosaurus, another sauropod from the Early Cretaceous of Utah.

What we know

  • Named by Tidwell et al., 2001.
  • Body length estimated at about 12 m.
  • Fossils found in Utah, USA.

What we guess

The reconstruction notes for Venenosaurus — soft tissue, color, behavior — haven't been written up yet. Only the recorded basics above are filled in so far.