Antarctopelta oliveroi
By José Carlos Cortés on @ryuukibart
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Name: Antarctopelta oliveroi
Name Meaning: Antarctic Shield
First Described: 2006
Described By: Salgado & Gasparini
Classification: Dinosauria, Ornithischia, Genasauria, Thyreophora, Eurypoda, Ankylosauria, Nodosauridae
Antarctopelta is a fairly dubious genus of Nodosaurid, though a relatively derived one, from James Ross Island in Antarctica, in the Snow Hill Island Foramtion, and was actually the first nonavian dinosaur found in Antarctica, though it was only the second to be named, after Cryolophosaurus. It lived about 74 to 70 million years ago, in the Campanian age of the Late Cretaceous, and was probably about 4 meters long. Though it has traits that have caused it to be placed as an Ankylosaurid as well as a Nodosaurid in the past, and often has been labeled as the basal-most Nodosaurid, it was recovered as being fairly derived in a recent robust phylogeny. It was found in marine sediments, indicating that its carcass was washed out to sea, and it probably lived in a forest of conifers and deciduous trees.
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antarctopelta
Arbour, V. M, & P. J. Currie. 2015. Systematics, phylogeny and palaeobiogeography of the ankylosaurid dinosaurs. Journal of Systematic Palaeontology DOI: 10.1080/14772019.2015.1059985
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