Maiasaura

Maiasaura peeblesorum

Maiasaura means good mother lizard, named for the evidence that it cared for its young. Large nesting colonies were found with eggs, babies, and juveniles of different ages, demonstrating parental care behavior.

Physical Description

Measurement	Value	Human Scale
Panjang	9.0 m	roughly the length of a large SUV
Height	2.3 m	—
Berat	4.0 t	comparable to 4.0 small cars

Diet & Feeding

Herbivore

Maiasaura was a plant-eating dinosaur. Herbivores typically fed on ferns, cycads, conifers, and other vegetation available during their era. Many herbivorous dinosaurs developed specialized teeth and digestive systems for processing tough plant material.

Time Period

Cretaceous Late Mesozoic Era

Maiasaura lived during the Cretaceous Late period of the Mesozoic Era, approximately 100,5 to 66,0 million years ago.

The final age of dinosaurs, featuring iconic species like Tyrannosaurus rex, Triceratops, and Velociraptor. Dinosaurs reached their peak diversity before the catastrophic asteroid impact at the Chicxulub crater ended the Mesozoic Era.

Discovery & Naming

Dinamai Oleh	Jack Horner & Robert Makela
Tahun Penemuan	1979
Lokasi Penemuan	Two Medicine Formation, Montana, USA

Klasifikasi

Dinosauria → Ornithischia → Hadrosauridae → Maiasaura

Duck-billed dinosaurs

Large herbivorous dinosaurs with broad, flattened snouts resembling duck bills. Many species had elaborate cranial crests used for display or vocalization. Extremely successful in the Late Cretaceous.