Velociraptor

Chapter • Meet the dinosaur

Overview

Velociraptor was a small, long-legged predatory dinosaur that would barely have reached an adult human's hip. It measured roughly 1.5–2.1 metres from snout to tail tip, much of that length being the stiffened, counterbalancing tail, and weighed around 15–20 kilograms. The skull was unusually long, low and slightly upturned at the snout, a shape that sets Velociraptor apart from most other dromaeosaurids. Each foot carried an enlarged, sickle-shaped claw on the second toe, held clear of the ground while walking. Quill knobs preserved on a forearm bone show that the arms bore long, stiff feathers, and the whole animal was almost certainly feathered — though it could not fly. It moved on two legs with the back held horizontally and the tail stretched out behind as a counterweight; there was no tail-dragging. Its slender build and long lower legs suggest an agile runner, with published estimates usually clustering around 35–40 km/h in short bursts. Measurements of the sclerotic ring in the eye socket have been interpreted as evidence for activity at night or in twilight, which would suit life in a hot desert. Endocasts show well-developed vision and balance centres, much as in modern birds. Velociraptor was a carnivore that most likely hunted animals smaller than itself: lizards, small mammals, juvenile herbivores and perhaps primitive birds. The old image of the foot claw as a slashing blade has been revised — current thinking is that it worked mainly as a grappling hook to pin prey while the jaws did the killing, much as birds of prey do today. Bite marks matching Velociraptor teeth on a Protoceratops jawbone also show that it scavenged carcasses when the opportunity arose. The first remains were found in 1923 by Peter Kaisen during the American Museum of Natural History expeditions to Mongolia, and Henry Fairfield Osborn named the species Velociraptor mongoliensis the following year — roughly "swift thief from Mongolia". The most famous specimen came to light in 1971, when a Polish–Mongolian team in the Djadochta Formation excavated the "Fighting Dinosaurs": a Velociraptor and a Protoceratops buried together in mid-combat. A second species, V. osmolskae, was described in 2008 from Bayan Mandahu in Inner Mongolia.

Chapter • Where it lived

Habitat

Velociraptor lived in the Late Cretaceous, during the Campanian around 75–71 million years ago, in what is now Mongolia and northern China. The landscape was a semi-arid desert of shifting dunes, seasonal streams and occasional waterholes. Most fossils come from the Djadochta Formation at Bayn Dzak (the "Flaming Cliffs") in the Gobi Desert and from Bayan Mandahu in Inner Mongolia. Many skeletons are remarkably complete, which has been explained by rapid burial in collapsing dunes or sandstorms. Sharing the same environment were animals such as Protoceratops, Oviraptor and early mammals.

Chapter • Family life

Breeding

Chapter • Wild behavior

Behavior & Ecology

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Chapter • Scientific place

Taxonomy