Paleontologists are scientists. They study history by examining things left behind in dirt and rocks. They look at fossils for clues about the animals that lived long ago. Fossils are preserved remains like bones and footprints. Paleontologists imagine what it was like to live in the age of dinosaurs. You do the same as you consider these size comparisons:
Big Yellow Bus: Tyrannosaurus Rex was likely a ferocious predator dinosaur. At 40 feet long and 12 feet tall, it was about the size of a school bus.
Long and Tall: Sauropods were the biggest dinosaurs that scientists have discovered. They stood six building stories high. Some of these big beasts may have been more than half the length of a football field from nose to tail!
Bowling Alley: The dino formerly known as Brontosaurus got a name change: Apatosaurus. This dinosaur was the length of two telephone poles, one and a half tractor trailer trucks, or one bowling alley lane. That’s a very long dinosaur!
Gobble, Gobble: A Compsognathus dinosaur was a meat-eating powerhouse. These small dinosaurs with big appetites were about the size of a turkey.
17 Elephants: A Brachiosaurus weighed as much as 17 elephants. It was four-fifths as heavy as a space shuttle. And it stood two and a half times taller than a giraffe.
That’s nuts! Stegosaurus might have been as big as a bus, but its brain was only the size of a nut.
Dino-Golf: Scientists believe Velociraptor was fast! But speedy was good if you were so small. Velociraptor stood just about 39 inches tall—barely over three feet.
Christmas Tree Tower: Pterosaurs were flying reptiles. The Pterosaurs had huge wingspans! (Wingspan is the distance from the tip of one wing to the tip of the other.) The largest Pterosaurs’ wingspan could be as much as 40 feet! That’s about the height of five average Christmas trees standing on top of one another.
Jumbo Dino: Big dinosaur bodies meant big dino-sized parts. A Tyrannosaurs Rex had extra-large teeth. They measured as long as half a bowling pin. A Torosaurus skull was eight feet long! That’s the length of an average female elephant. In 1998, scientists at the University of Kansas found a giant dinosaur foot in Wyoming. It was the largest dino foot fossil ever found. The Brachiosaur foot measured 3.3 feet. That’s almost as wide as a mailbox is tall.
