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Albertaceratops nesmoi

This is my attempt at Albertaceratops nesmoi. This is pretty my first attempt at a ceratopsian as well...

The plate-like epidermal structure on the face is purely speculation on my part.

Albertaceratops is yet another one of those interesting centrosaurine with a blade-like nasal 'horn' or ridge, but with postorbital horns that are very large for a centrosaurine.

If ceratopsians locked their horns in intraspecific combat, then Albertaceratops must have had a fairly similar style of combat with Triceratops and other long-horned chasmosaurines - perhaps???

Comments

traumador said…
Awesome work.

I'm a sucker for Albertoceratops. I worked at the Tyrrell for the 3 years they were preping it, and it's been cool to see how it went from the slightly interesting "Dinosaur Park Pachyrhino" to a huge international palaeo star when Dr. Ryan choose the new name and published it.

It's just too bad their attempt to find the frill didn't turn anything up (except a partial turtle shell).
Turtle shell, eh? That's hilarious! But then, they do look very similar, turtle shells and centrosaurine frills:)
traumador said…
It was a tiny turtle sadly... Or they would have had something to sick on the back end of his head indeed LOL

It's an interesting skeleton all round. I can't remember if Dr. Ryan's description went into detail on it or not, but this is as palaeo-pathologic a skeleton as you can get.

The poor Albertaceratops had some sort of major infection of it's feet that had rooted the toes while animal was still alive! Darren Tanke is studying it further, and probably publishing something on it soonish (if he hasn't already). He suspects something to do with really aggresive fungus.

Anyways loving your blog, and your drawings are awesome!
Zach said…
Good stuff, and Albertaceratops is one of the more interesting centrosaurines. You know, because it has long brow horns and no nasal horn.
It seems similar to Jim Kirkland's unnamed centrosaurine, which I called "octoceratops" back on the original blog. Brow horns, two small nasal horns, and large jugal horns (like Pentaceratops). From what I read, it also came out as a basal centrosaurine.
Good drawing, though. Great detail on the head, and I'm glad to see you gave it "semi-sprawling" forelimbs, which is what the current research suggests.

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