Xenoceratops, Canada’s Oldest Ceratopsid

[paleoferroequine]

More spiky goodness!    Xenoceratops foremostensis is not only the oldest known ceratopsid from western Canada, but one of the oldest members of Ceratopsidae currently known at about 80 million years ago. It was found originally in 1958! About 20 ft. (6.096m).



Here's where to read about it.
http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/story/10.4141/news.2012.11.05.92
http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/full/10.1139/e2012-056

[Balaur]

That's one cool ceratopsian!

[ZoPteryx]

Nice find!  I wonder if they actually found the brow horns though or if those are speculative.

[wings]

Nice find!  I wonder if they actually found the brow horns though or if those are speculative.

It seems all they have is the frill (parietal, epiparietal and squamosal) and bits of the nasal and no postorbital found which is where the brow horn is located (see http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/full/10.1139/e2012-056, you can download the paper for free there).

[s.foulkes]

looks like they filled in the missing fossil material with Albertoceratops features.

[Jetoar]

Cool new ceratopsid  .

[wings]

looks like they filled in the missing fossil material with Albertoceratops features.

Due to incompleteness nature of the materials, a lot of features on this animal is inferred from other basal centrosaurines. This was mentioned on the discussion section of the paper (see above link). They infer that the animal had elongate, robust brow horns similar to Albertaceratops and Diabloceratops. As for the nasal horn/boss, the authors thinks that it has an elongate, low nasal boss similar to that of Medusaceratops.

[Bokisaurus]

A perfect candidate for CollectA 2014

[Jetoar]

I think the same  .

[Iguanocolossus]

As a ceratopsid fan, these past three years have been excellent. Okay, so we have to deal with nonsense about quills and Horner's idiocy, but all these new, cool-looking genera are a real treat.