Deinonychus facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Deinonychus Temporal range: Lower Cretaceous
Deinonychus skeleton at the Field Museum, Chicago.
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Class:	Sauropsida
Superorder:	Dinosauria
Order:	Saurischia
Suborder:	Theropoda
(unranked):	Coelurosauria
Family:	Dromaeosauridae
Subfamily:	Dromaeosaurinae
Genus:	Deinonychus
Binomial name
Deinonychus antirrhopus Ostrom, 1969

An artist's idea of what Deinonychus looked like.

Reconstructed foot bones showing its famous sickle-claw.

Deinonychus was a medium-sized theropod dinosaur. This means it was a meat-eating dinosaur that walked on two legs. It was a type of dromaeosaur, which are known for their sharp claws. Deinonychus was also a larger relative of the famous Velociraptor. This dinosaur was about 3.4 meters (11 feet) long. It lived during the Lower Cretaceous period, around 115 to 108 million years ago. Scientists have found its fossils in the U.S. states of Montana, Wyoming, and Oklahoma.

Deinonychus is considered one of the most important dinosaur discoveries from the mid-20th century. Its discovery helped change how scientists thought about dinosaurs.

What Did Deinonychus Eat?

Scientists have found Deinonychus fossils close to another dinosaur called Tenontosaurus. Tenontosaurus was a plant-eating dinosaur. Teeth from Deinonychus have been found near Tenontosaurus bones. This suggests that Deinonychus either hunted Tenontosaurus or ate its remains after it died.

Images for kids

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  Specimen MCZ 4371 with a skull cast at the Harvard Museum of Natural History.

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  A reconstructed skeleton of Deinonychus (AMNH 3015).

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  The size of Deinonychus compared to a human.

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  The size of Deinonychus (number 6) compared to other dromaeosaurids.

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  An artist's idea of Deinonychus hunting a Zephyrosaurus.

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  A Deinonychus foot (MOR 747) showing how it could bend.

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  A reconstructed skull and neck at the Royal Ontario Museum.

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  A cast of Deinonychus in a climbing position.

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  Hand bones of Deinonychus (MOR 747).

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  An artist's restoration of a walking Deinonychus.

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  An artist's idea of Deinonychus sitting like a bird on a nest.

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  Mounted skeletons of Deinonychus and Zephyrosaurus at the Natural History Museum of Denmark.

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  A model of a feathered Deinonychus next to an older, featherless model.

See also

In Spanish: Deinonychus antirrhopus para niños