Dino of the Week: Lingwulong

Type Species: Lingwulong shenqi

Classification: Dinosauria – Saurischia – Sauropoda – Gravisauria - Eusauropoda - Neosauropoda - Diplodocoidea - Flagellicaudata - Dicraeosauridae 

Time Period: Early Jurassic

Location: China

Diet: Herbivore

Lingwulong was a sauropod that lived in southern Laurasia sometime between the late Toarcian stage of the Early Jurassic and through the Bajocian stage of the Middle Jurassic. The fossils discovered belong to seven to ten individuals at different stages of growth, indicating that they belonged to a family herd. These sauropods had U-shaped snouts and grew up to fifty feet in length. Lingwulong is considered a ‘neosauropod’ (or ‘new sauropod’), the group to which most sauropods belong. The neosauropods are composed of two subgroups: Diplodocoidea and Macronaria. The neosauropods were the largest land animals to have ever lived, and Lingwulong is the earliest known of the group. It’s considered a dicraeosaurid, a ‘sister group’ to the diplodocids. Dicraeosaurids are differentiated from the diplodocids by their relatively small body size and short necks.