Sarahsaurus

What it was like

Sarahsaurus was an early relative of the giant sauropods, a medium-sized plant eater with a long neck and a long tail. Its hands were strong, with large claws on the thumbs, which it may have used for grabbing plants or for defense.

Its world

It lived about 200 to 184 million years ago, in the Early Jurassic, in what is now Arizona. Its bones come from the Kayenta Formation, where it shared the land with the crested predator Dilophosaurus and the small armored Scutellosaurus.

How it was found

Rowe and colleagues named Sarahsaurus in 2011. The type species is Sarahsaurus aurifontanalis. Its closest relatives include Massospondylus from southern Africa, which suggests that animals of this kind spread widely across the joined continents of the time.