Lusotitan

Type Species: Lusotitan atalaiensis

Classification: Dinosauria – Saurischia – Sauropoda - Gravisauria - Eusauropoda - Neosauropoda – Macronaria – Titanosauriformes – Brachiosauridae

Time Period: Late Jurassic 

Location: Europe 

Diet: Herbivore

The Late Jurassic sauropod Lusotitan lived in prehistoric Portugal as part of Portugal’s Lourinha Formation, which resembled North America’s Morrison Formation and which emerged as a result of the genesis of the Atlantic Ocean. This brachiosaurid was related to the North American Brachiosaurus, and it grew up to seventy to eighty feet in length. Lusotitan walked on four pillar-like legs; its front legs were longer than its back legs, so that its body sloped downwards towards its short tail. Some scientists believe it could rear back on its hind legs to reach super high foliage, though some believe it kept its four legs on the ground at all times. Lusotitan’s neck reached vertical rather than horizontal like diplodocids. This gave it a feeding advantage: whereas most of its sauropod contemporaries were low-browsing diplodocids, Lusotitan could browse foliage up to fifty feet off the ground to feed on high conifers and ginkgoes. It undoubtedly practiced niche partitioning alongside the low-browsing diplodocid Dinheirosaurus. As part of the Lourinha Formation, it also lived alongside large predators such as Allosaurus and Torvosaurus, stegosaurs such as Dacentrurus and Miragaia, the early ankylosaur Dracopelta, and numerous early ornithopods.