NAME

Meaning - Dilophosaurus means “double-crested lizard”
Pronounced - die-LOF-oh-SAWR-us
Named By - Samuel P. Welles
When Named - 1970
DIET

Carnivore (meat-eater) - it ate smaller plant-eating dinosaurs.
SIZE

Length - 20 feet (6 m) long
Height - 5 feet (1.5 m) tall at the hips
Weight - 650 to 1,000 pounds (300 kg to 450 kg)
WHEN IT LIVED

Early Jurassic period, about 201 to 189 million years ago
WHERE IT LIVED

Fossils have been found in Arizona, USA, North America. Another specimen may have been found in China, Asia.
FOSSILS

The first fossil Dilophosaurus skeleton was found in Arizona, USA, in the 1940’s. Three Dilophosaurus fossils have been found in the USA, all found together in Arizona. They are now at the University of California’s Museum of Paleontology at Berkeley, USA. Fossils similar to those of Dilophosaurus have been found in many places around the world.
CLASSIFICATION
  • Kingdom Animalia (animals)
  • Phylum Chordata (having a hollow nerve chord ending in a brain)
  • Class Archosauria (diapsids with socket-set teeth, etc.)
  • Order Saurischia - lizard-hipped dinosaurs
  • Suborder Theropoda - bipedal carnivores
  • Family Ceratosauria (also called Coelophysoidea - the most primitive theropod group, which includes Dilophosaurus and Segisaurus)
  • Genus Dilophosaurus
  • Species wetherilli (type species: Welles, 1954 - this species was originally called Megalosaurus wetherilli)
INTERESTING FACTS

Dilophosaurus was a fast-moving bipedal predator that had a double crest on its head. Although it was depicted as spitting poison in the Jurassic Park movie, there is no fossil evidence that it did so (it was also pictured far too small, with an incorrect skull, and with a frill it did not have).
LINKS

A detailed page on Dilophosaurus.
A page on Dilophosaurus coloring/information printout.
A K-3 Dilophosaurus Printout
A Dilophosaurus word hunt activity - For second and third graders.