A few days ago, paleontologists from France discovered a two-meter long dinosaur femur. The gigantic femur was found at an old excavation site in the south west of France. The excavations of the biggest animals that had been alive millions of years ago are being overseen since 2010.
At the Angeac-Charente excavation site were discovered over 7,500 fossils that belonged to over 40 different dinosaur species. The thigh bone is believed to belong to a dinosaur whose diet consisted mostly of plants and who lived almost 140 million years ago. By the size of the well-preserved bone, the paleontologists estimated that the sauropod was around 40 or 50 tonnes in weight.
The newly discovered sauropod was part of the saurischian clade of dinosaurs whose characteristics were extremely long necks, very long tails, small heads, and four bulky legs. The name of this species was given by O.C. Marsh in 1878 and means ‘lizard foot’.
Two-meter long dinosaur femur discovered in France belonged to a giant sauropod
They were gigantic in size; the smallest had 5 or 6 meters (16 to 19 feet), while the bigger ones could reach 35 meters (over 114 feet) in length. The biggest in height could even reach 18 meters (60 feet). Among well-known sauropods were the Brachiosaurus, Diplodocus, Apatosaurus, Brontosaurus, and Mamenchisaurus. Some sauropods had very long tails that were used as weapons against predators.
The sauropods are believed to first appear in the Late Triassic Period and have bread in such manner that by Late Jurassic (around 150 million years ago) they widely spread.
Many fossils of sauropods have been discovered on each continent, even Antarctica. Unfortunately, most of the fossils were not complete, the almost-complete ones being short of heads, parts of the tail or limbs. Most of the fossils found were singular bones. Sauropod footprints had been also found, the biggest one yet being discovered in Australia and measured 1.7 meters (5.6 feet).
Bo has over six years experience as a teacher, advocate and speaker. He has a B.S. from Cornell University, and a Ph.D. in Human rights from Harvard University Graduate School.