Stegosaurs facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Stegosauria Temporal range: Middle Jurassic – Lower Cretaceous, 176–100 mya
Fossil skeleton of a Stegosaurus, National Museum of Natural History
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Class:	Sauropsida
Superorder:	Dinosauria
Order:	Ornithischia
Suborder:	Thyreophora
Infraorder:	Stegosauria

A fossil melée involving a stegosaurian (Tuojiangosaurus) and a mid-sized theropod (Monolophosaurus), Field Museum in Chicago

The Stegosaurs were a group of dinosaurs in the suborder Thyreophora. They have small heads, peg-like teeth and vertical bony plates and spines on their back and tail. They flourished from the Upper Jurassic to the Lower Cretaceous.

Classification

The Stegosauria was originally named as an order by O.C. Marsh in 1877. Now it is treated as an infraorder or suborder (or simply a clade) within Thyreophora, the armoured dinosaurs. It includes the families Huayangosauridae and Stegosauridae.

The Huayangosauridae were an early family of stegosaurs which lived during the Middle Jurassic. They were smaller than later stegosaurs and had shorter and higher skulls. Currently, the only confirmed genus included is the type genus Huayangosaurus of China. The poorly-known remains of Regnosaurus from England, however, indicate it too could be a member. Its lower jaw is very similar to the former.

The vast majority of stegosaurs being to the Stegosauridae, found in the later part of the Jurassic and the early Cretaceous. It includes the well-known Stegosaurus. The family is widespread, with members across the Northern Hemisphere and Africa.

Suborder Thyreophora

Infraorder Stegosauria

• Family Huayangosauridae
  • Huayangosaurus (Sichuan, China)
  • ?Regnosaurus (Sussex, England)
• Family Stegosauridae
  • Chialingosaurus – (Sichuan, China)
  • Chungkingosaurus – (Chongqing, China)
  • Dacentrurus – (England, France & Spain)
  • Hesperosaurus – (Wyoming, USA)
  • Miragaia – (Portugal)
  • Monkonosaurus – (Tibet, China)
  • Paranthodon – (South Africa)
  • Wuerhosaurus – (Xinjiang, Western China)
  • Kentrosaurus – (Tanzania, Africa)
  • Lexovisaurus – (England & France)
  • Stegosaurus – (Wyoming, USA)
  • Tuojiangosaurus – (Sichuan, China)
  •  ?Craterosaurus – (Bedfordshire, England)
  • Jiangjunosaurus – (Xinjiang, Western China)

• Uncertain placement (incertae sedis)
  • Gigantspinosaurus – (Sichuan, China)

Images for kids

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  Stegosaurus mount showing to a good effect the high neck posture, the throat ossicles and the robust shoulder girdle and forelimbs

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  Stegosaurus bones illustrated by Arthur Lakes in 1879

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  Huayangosaurus is the oldest and most basal stegosaurian of which good material is known, giving an impression of the build of the earliest members of the group

See also

In Spanish: Stegosauria para niños