During the end of the Cretaceous Period, some of the most common large, herbivorous dinosaurs
in western North American were the horned ceratopsids. They had a dazzling array of horns
and frills, with each species possessing its own unique arrangement. The horns of one ceratopsid,
Nasutoceratops, are particularly unique. They were incredibly long, so long that they have
been compared to Texan longhorns. The first Nasutoceratops skeleton was found in 2006,
although it wasn’t named until 2013. It has recently become a lot more popular due to
appearing in the Jurassic World franchise, such as in the Jurassic World short film Battle at Big
Rock, the Jurassic World Evolution series, and it is set to appear in Jurassic World Domination.
However, Nasutoceratops’s portrayal in film has not been entirely accurate.
Nasutoceratops weighed about one and a half tons and was a little less than five meters long.
Such a size was large by today’s standards but smaller than many other ceratopsids and much
smaller than its appearance in Jurassic World. However, its skull was one and half meters long.
Nasutoceratops’s massive brow horns were one meter long, nearly reaching the end of its
snout. The comparisons to Texan longhorns do not just come from the length of these horns.
The base of each horn was just above the eyes and, and like those of a Texan longhorn,
they came out from the side instead of from the front. When viewed from the side,
Nasutoceratops’s brow horns curved slightly up towards the end but were mostly straight.
But when viewed from the top, they curved outwards and then curved back inwards.
While ceratopsid horns are often thought of as weapons used to defend themselves from predators,
it is now thought they were primarily used to attract mates,
either through visual display or combat. In the case of Nasutoceratops, it is thought rivals
may have interlocked their horns together and engaged in a sort of horn wrestling contest.
This would have been a lot safer than actually trying to stab each other. Still, defense could
have been a secondary function of Nasutoceratops’s horns. At the very least, they would have been an
obstacle for any predator trying to attack it from the front. Nasutoceratops’s name means “big-nosed
horned face “. This isn’t in reference to its nasal horn, which is low and flat.
With its position behind its tall, round nose, it is easy to not even notice it. Instead,
its name is in reference to the nose itself, which is massive compared to most other ceratopsids.
The nose was pneumatic, meaning it had empty, air-filled spaces. As of right now, the exact
purpose of these spaces is a mystery. Another trait that sets Nasutoceratops apart is the length
of its snout. Even though its nose was tall, the actual snout short by ceratopsid standards.
However, Nasutoceratops’s frill was fairly normal. It was of moderate size and had small, rounded
bony osteoderms along the edges. While it may have had few adornments, in life the frill was likely
brightly colored so as to broadcast fitness to rivals and potential mates Besides their skulls,
the bodies of ceratopsids were fairly similar to each other, and what is known of Nasutoceratops is
no exception. However, the holotype skeleton does contain three preserved impressions of its scales,
all of which were found near its shoulder. Some of these were semi-circular to oval shaped.
The scales on a different patch were a mixture of hexagonal shaped scales
with smaller triangular scales between them. Within Ceratopsidae, Nasutoceratop belonged to
the clade Centrosaurinae. Centrosaurines generally had short frills, much like Nasutoceratops,
as well as short brow horns and a long nasal horn. The other major clade of ceratopsids,
Chasmosaurinae instead usually had short nasal horns and longer brow horns and frills. While
Nasutoceratops s may seem more a chasmosaurine, longs brow horns were ancestral to ceratopsids and
were also present in other early centrosaurines such as Xenoceratops. The more classic appearance
of the centrosaurines only appeared later. Nasutoceratops is also the namesake of
Nasutoceratopsini, a clade of centrosaurines who also retained the ancestral horn arrangement.
Other nasutoceratopsins include Crittendenceratops and Menefeeceratops. Nasutoceratopsins had short,
deep snouts and undecorated frills, which is also like Nasutoceratops itself.
Even though Nasutoceratops was small for a ceratopsid, it is still the largest known
nasutoceratopsin. Nasutoceratops’s fossils are from the Kaiparowits Formation,
which is in the southwestern United States. It was formed between 76.5 to 74 million years ago.
Despite Jurassic World: Dominion implying that Nasutoceratops and Tyrannosaurus
were contemporaries, Tyrannosaurus wouldn’t evolve until about six million years later.
While the Kaiparowits Plateau is now arid, when Nasutoceratops was alive this region consisted of
coastal wetlands near the Western Interior Seaway. Besides Nasutoceratops, the Kaiparowits Formation
was also home to the chasmosaurines Utahceratops and Kosmoceratop and a second unnamed species
of centrosaurine. Other contemporaries included the ankylosaurid Akainacephalus and a species
of the hadrosaur Parasaurolophus. The top predators were the tyrannosaurid Teratophoneus
and the gigantic crocodilian Deinosuchus. When Nasutoceratops was found, it was thought that
the Kaiparowits Formation was contemporaneous with the Dinosaur Park Formation to the north in
Alberta. However, the dinosaurs found at the two sites are very different. Combined with how the
dinosaurs in the south seemed to be more closely related to each than to the species up north, this
supported the idea that western North America was divided into at least two different ecosystems.
Nasutoceratopsins appeared to be restricted to the south while the eucentrosaurs,
the centrosaurines with long nasal horns, appeared to have been restricted to the north. However,
more recent work on the age of the Kaiparowits Formation has found that its fauna actually lived
after the species in the Dinosaur Park Formation. Furthermore, nasutoceratopsins don’t seem to
have been as geographically restricted as once thought. A few, such as Avaceratops and a second,
currently unmanned species, have been found in the north. This doesn’t necessarily mean that there
wasn’t was a divide between the north and south in western North America. However, at the very least,
it was less extreme than once thought, so it is possible Nasutoceratops was more widespread.
Regardless of whether or not it only lived in the southwest, Nasutoceratops has revealed much
about ceratopsid evolution. Not only did it have unique headgear, but Nasutoceratops has revealed
the existence of a new clade of ceratopsids. Although its appearance is Jurassic World Dominion
is not accurate, perhaps is will encourage more people to learn about the real Nasutoceratops.
Thank you for watching. I hope you learned something interesting.
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