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THERIZINOSAURUS (THER-ih-ZIN-oh-SORE-us)

Period: Late Cretaceous

Order, Suborder, Family: Saurischia, Segnosauria, Segnosauridae

Location: Asia (Mongolia)

Length: Possibly up to 30 feet; Weight: Possibly up to 5 tons;

In 1948, several giant claw bones were found by a Soviet-Mongolian scientific team in the Nemegt Basin of the Gobi Desert of Mongolia. Because the shape of the claws is similar to the claws of some turtles and because the claws were found with large, flat bones, workers first thought they belonged to a giant turtle. So the specimen was named Therizinosaurus cheloniformis ("turtle-like scythe reptile") by the famous Soviet paleontologist E. A. Maleyev.

Other finds of similar claws, including one with a partial arm, proved that the claws belonged to a dinosaur. The most interesting feature of these claws is their size.

One bony portion of the claw is 28 inches long. In life, the claw would have been covered by hornlike material, making it even longer. It is probably from a very large segnosaur.

In recent years several additional members of the Segnosauridae family have been discovered, including one species in New Mexico. These have enabled us to form a fairly good idea of what Therezinosaurus probably looked like.

This is a customized Galaxy Therizinosaurus figure.

It has been moved to an upright posture, the claws replaces and re-moulded using wire and putty, cheeks and frill built up with putty.