| Lamaceratops | |
|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Superorder: | Dinosauria |
| Order: | Ornithischia |
| Infraorder: | Ceratopsia |
| Family: | Protoceratopsidae |
| Genus: | Lamaceratops |
| Species | |
|
Lamaceratops tereschenkoi |
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Lamaceratops,"Lama Horned Face", is a dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous period. It is classified as a ceratopsian, a herbivorous "frilled" or armored dinosaur similar to, but smaller than, Bagaceratops. It had a horn on the front of its face, much like most of the later Ceratopsids.
The fossils of Lamaceratops have been found in Mongolia. The type species is Lamaceratops tereschenkoi. It was first described by Aliafanov in 2003.
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Lamaceratops belonged to Protoceratopsidae within the Ceratopsia (the name is Greek for "horned face"), a group of herbivorous dinosaurs with parrot-like beaks which thrived in North America and Asia during the Cretaceous Period, which ended roughly 65 million years ago.
Some palaeontologists have classified it as a member of the Bagaceratopidae, a family of several genera closely related to Bagaceratops. It may be only a variant of Bagaceratops.[1]
Lamaceratops, like all ceratopsians, was a herbivore. During the Cretaceous, flowering plants were "geographically limited on the landscape", and so it is likely that this dinosaur fed on the predominant plants of the era: ferns, cycads and conifers. It would have used its sharp ceratopsian beak to bite off the leaves or needles.