Triceratops
As a Triceratops you would carry a skull the length of a small car – and you would be among the last non-bird dinosaurs alive when the asteroid hit.
One of the last of its kind
Triceratops lived in western North America from about 68 to 66 million years ago, in the Hell Creek, Lance and related formations of Montana, the Dakotas, Wyoming and Alberta/Saskatchewan. It is one of the most common large dinosaurs found there, and its fossils come from right up to the end-Cretaceous extinction layer.
Adults reached about 8–9 metres long and an estimated 6–12 tonnes. The skull alone could exceed 2 metres – one of the largest skulls of any land animal. Skin impressions from at least one specimen show large, rounded scales, some with nipple-like bumps, so a scaly hide rather than feathers is the best-supported look.
Horns for what?
Two long brow horns, a short nose horn and a solid bony frill made Triceratops look like a fortress. Healed wounds on skulls, matching horn-locking injuries, show that individuals fought each other, probably head-to-head like modern antelope. Bite marks from Tyrannosaurus on Triceratops bones, including at least one healed horn, show the two did meet – sometimes the Triceratops survived.
The frill was likely also for display, to signal age and status. Unlike many relatives, Triceratops’ frill had no large openings.
Chewing machine – and the Torosaurus question
Your parrot-like beak would snip tough plants, and rows of shearing teeth – hundreds, stacked in dental batteries – sliced them up. Triceratops was one of the most efficient plant processors of its time.
In 2010 John Scannella and Jack Horner proposed that Torosaurus, a similar animal with a longer, holed frill, was simply the fully mature form of Triceratops. The idea was widely publicised, but later studies of skull shapes and bone growth have mostly argued the two are separate genera; the question is not completely closed.
