Brachiosaurus Facts

Brachiosaurus Facts
Brachiosaurus was a giraffe-like dinosaur and a member of a group of sauropod dinosaurs. It lived 155.7 to 150.8 million years ago (mid- to late Jurassic Period) in North America and Africa (Tanzania). Brachiosaurus resided in the flat plains in semiarid areas with prominent wet and dry seasons. First fossil of Brachiosaurus was found in Grand River Valley in Colorado in 1900. It was then described as the largest dinosaur on the planet. Even though larger species have been discovered since then, Brachiosaurus is definitely one of the largest and one of the most popular type of dinosaurs.
Interesting Brachiosaurus Facts:
Brachiosaurus was around 85 feet long and it had 35 to 40 tons of weight.
Unlike many other dinosaurs, Brachiosaurus was able to keep its body temperature stable at roughly 38 to 45 degrees of Celsius. Metabolism of Brachiosaurus was somewhere in between the metabolism of cold-blooded and warm-blooded animals.
Brachiosaurus had small, egg-shaped head with nostrils positioned on top of it. It had wide muzzle and thick jaw bones, very long neck, large trunk and relatively short tail (compared with other sauropods).
Name "Brachiosaurus" means "arm lizard". Name refers to the unusually large front legs that were much larger than hind legs.
Brachiosaurus was quadrupedal animal, which means that it walked using all of its legs.
Brachiosaurus was a herbivore. Its diet was based on plants that were roughly 30 feet above the ground, such as various conifers, cycads and ginkgos.
Brachiosaurus had 26 spoon-shaped teeth in each jaw (52 teeth in total). Teeth were designed for stripping vegetation from the high branches.
Brachiosaurus had to eat 440 to 880 pounds of food per day to survive.
Brachiosaurus lived in herds that were moving toward new areas as soon as food supplies in the occupied areas become reduced to a minimum.
First fossil of Brachiosaurus was publicly presented to the museum audience in 1994, nearly 100 years after its discovery.
Skull of Brachiosaurus is loosely attached to the rest of the skeleton and it can be easily removed from the body after death either by predators or natural disasters. That's why skeleton of Brachiosaurus discovered in the 19th century, erroneously marked as Apatosaurus, was headless for nearly a century, before scientists finally managed to "find" a missing skull.
Brachiosaurus was represented in the popular movie "Jurassic Park", based on the Michael Crichton book.
Even though Brachiosaurus was "able to stand" on the hind legs in the movie "Jurassic Park", this wasn't possible in the real life because of the specific anatomy of the body and its huge weight.
Main belt asteroid, 1991 GX7, in the Solar System was named 9954 Brachiosaurus.
Huge size and slow metabolic rate of Brachiosaurus were responsible for a lifespan of nearly 100 years.


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