![]() Despite its popularity in books and film, mounted skeletons of Stegosaurus did not become a staple of major natural history museums until the mid-20th century, and many museums have had to assemble composite displays from several different specimens due to a lack of complete skeletons. The first known skeletons were fragmentary and the bones were scattered, and it would be many years before the true appearance of these animals, including their posture and plate arrangement, became well understood. Stegosaurus remains were first identified during the " Bone Wars" by Othniel Charles Marsh at Dinosaur Ridge National Landmark. One species, Stegosaurus ungulatus, is one of the largest known of all the stegosaurians, reaching 7 metres (23 ft) in length and 3.8 metric tons (4.2 short tons) in body mass, and some specimens indicate an even larger body size. It had a short neck and a small head, meaning it most likely ate low-lying bushes and shrubs. Stegosaurus had a relatively low brain-to-body mass ratio. Today, it is generally agreed that their spiked tails were most likely used for defense against predators, while their plates may have been used primarily for display, and secondarily for thermoregulatory functions. The function of this array of plates and spikes has been the subject of much speculation among scientists. Due to their distinctive combination of broad, upright plates and tail tipped with spikes, Stegosaurus is one of the most recognizable kinds of dinosaurs. ![]() They were large, heavily built, herbivorous quadrupeds with rounded backs, short fore limbs, long hind limbs, and tails held high in the air. Stegosaurus would have lived alongside dinosaurs such as Apatosaurus, Diplodocus, Camarasaurus and Allosaurus, the latter of which may have preyed on it. The remains of over 80 individual animals of this genus have been found. Of the species that have been classified in the upper Morrison Formation of the western US, only three are universally recognized: S. ![]() Fossils of the genus have been found in the western United States and in Portugal, where they are found in Kimmeridgian- to Tithonian-aged strata, dating to between 155 and 145 million years ago. 'roof-lizard') is a genus of herbivorous, four-legged, armored dinosaur from the Late Jurassic, characterized by the distinctive kite-shaped upright plates along their backs and spikes on their tails. Stegosaurus ( / ˌ s t ɛ ɡ ə ˈ s ɔːr ə s/ lit.
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