Leptoceratops

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Leptoceratops
Fossil range: Late Cretaceous

Leptoceratops, by Peter Trusler, 1999

Conservation status

Extinct (fossil)

Scientific classification

Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Sauropsida
Superorder:	Dinosauria
Order:	Ornithischia
Suborder:	Cerapoda
Infraorder:	Ceratopsia
Family:	Leptoceratopsidae
Genus:	Leptoceratops
Species:	L. gracilis

Binomial name

Leptoceratops gracilis
Brown, 1914

Leptoceratops (meaning 'lean-horned face' and derived from Greek 'lepto-/λεπτο-' meaning 'small', 'insignificant', 'slender', 'meagre' or 'lean', 'cerat-/κερατ-' meaning 'horn' and '-ops/ωψ' meaning face) was a primitive ceratopsian dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous Period of what is now Western North America, at the same time as its giant relatives Triceratops and Torosaurus. Its skulls have been found in Alberta, Canada and in Wyoming. It could probably stand and run on its hind legs. Leptoceratops was around 2 meters long and could have weighed anywhere between 68 kilograms and even 200 kilograms.

1 Discovery and Species
2 Classification
3 Diet
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Discovery and Species

Leptoceratops, the first small ceratopsian described, was discovered in 1910 (and described four years later), by Barnum Brown in the Red Deer Valley in Alberta, Canada. The first specimen had a part of its skull missing, however there have been later well-preserved finds by C. M. Sternberg in 1947, including one complete fossil (a very rare find indeed). There has been later material found in 1978 in Bighorn Basin in northern Wyoming.

Leptoceratops species

L. gracilis

In 1942, material collected in Montana was named Leptoceratops cerorhynchos but this was later renamed Montanoceratops.

[edit] Classification

Leptoceratops belonged to the Ceratopsia (the name is Ancient Greek for 'horned face'), a group of herbivorous dinosaurs with parrot-like beaks that thrived in North America and Asia during the Cretaceous Period. Within this group, it has been placed either in Protoceratopsidae or its own family Leptoceratopsidae.

[edit] Diet

Leptoceratops, like all Ceratopsians, was a herbivore. During the Cretaceous Period, flowering plants were "geographically limited on the landscape", so it is likely that this dinosaur fed on the predominant plants of the era: ferns, cycads and conifers. It would have used its sharp Ceratopsian beak to bite off the leaves or needles.