The fossil of a sauropod?-- a large, long-necked
herbivorous dinosaur --?has been unearthed after a month of
excavations near Zigong Dinosaur Museum in Zigong City, southwest
China's Sichuan
Province, Sichuan Daily reported on December 15.
"It must have been a big guy when it lived in the middle
Jurassic period, about 160 million years ago," paleontologist Li
Fei said at the excavation site. "It is over 20 meters long and its
longest rib measures 1.93 meters."
None of the sauropod's neck vertebrae have yet been found, but
shinbone and thighbone fossils from another animal were discovered
beneath it.
A 109-millimeter-long fossilized tooth was identified in the
sauropod's ribs along with six broken teeth fossils nearby that Li
said probably belonged to a carnivorous dinosaur.
"Based on this, we conclude this sauropod may have been killed
by a predator," said Li.
Besides the huge fossil skeleton, some fossilized fish scales
and tortoise shells were also discovered at the site.
The sauropod fossil is the largest to be found at Zigong since
the cluster was first unearthed in 1979, overtaking the remains of
an 18-meter-long Omeisaurus tianfuensis.
The Zigong Dinosaur Museum is the world's third largest after
one in each Canada and the US, and houses the complete fossils of
more than 100 dinosaurs.
In 1902, the first identified Chinese dinosaur fossil was
discovered in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang,
and the number unearthed in China is the third largest in the
world?-- over 100 species.
(Xinhua News Agency December 20, 2005)