Ceratopsian Month #24 – Utahceratops gettyi

An illustration of the extinct ceratopsid dinosaur Utahceratops, shown in a sitting position. It's a chunky quadrupedal dinosaur with a parrot-like beak, short nose horn, stubby sideways-pointing brow horns, and a large rectangular frill ending in a U-shaped notch with a pair of forward-curving spikes. It's depicted with speculative short quills over its back and tail, and it's colored black with white zebra-like stripes and red and yellow eyespot markings on its frill.

Utahceratops (“Utah horned face”) lived about 76-75 million years ago in Utah, USA. Partial remains of six different individuals have been found, allowing for about 95% of the skull and 70% of the rest of the skeleton to be accurately reconstructed – giving a full body length of around 4.5m (14’9″), with the skull alone being over 2m long (6′6″).

Its nose horn was positioned quite far back on its snout, and its short blunt brow horns pointed out to the sides. The top of its long frill ended in a U-shaped notch, with the first pair of spikes curving forwards.

Despite how proportionally large the skulls of chasmosaurs like Utahceratops were, they weren’t nearly as heavy as they might look. Instead of being made of solid bone, there were large openings in the frill (known as fenestrae) that helped to significantly reduce its weight.

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