Customer Reviews

Ankylosaurus and Other Armored Plant-Eaters (Prehistoric World)

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I was surprised that this five title series looking at the Dinosaurs actually devoted an entire volume to the Ankylosaurus, instead of all of the Thyreophorans, which would include the Scelidosaurs and the Stegosaurs. But then I am even more surprised that I have an understanding of the different suborders and infraorders in the dinosaur family tree. However, that is the approach Virginia Schomp takes in these books, which try to provide more of a scientific approach to the study of dinosaurs. There are over a dozen illustrations of various armored dinosaurs as well as a photograph of the fossilized plated skin of one such creature. For each type of dinosaur we learn when it lived during the Age of Dinosaurs, where on earth it could be found, and its relative size and distinguishing details.

Ankylosaurus lived mostly in the Late Cretaceous period, so there is a chapter devoted to the changing world that marked the last great age of the dinosaurs. But most of the book is devoted to the characteristics of these dinosaurs and recreating what their lives would have been like. Other titles in this series look at "Apatosaurus and Other Giant Long-Necked Plant-Eaters," "Triceratops and Other Horned Plant-Eaters," "Tyrannosaurus and Other Giant Meat-Eaters," and "Velociraptor and Other Small, Speedy Meat-Eaters." Together they provide a solid understanding of the five main branches in the family tree of the Dinosaurs and of the scientific study of these fascinating prehistoric creatures.