Labels:text | font | paper | screenshot | document OCR: Three nearly complete skeletons from the Gobi Desert make Gallimimus ("chicken mimic") the best-known ostrich - or ornithomimid ("bird mimic") - dinosaur. Over twice the length of a modern-day ostrich, Gallimimus was the largest member of a group of lightly built theropods ("beast-footed" dinosaurs) known from East Asia and North America. It had a toothless beak, a slim neck, a short body, a stiffened tail, three-fingered hands, and slender legs. It also had a bird's intelligence and big, outward-facing eyes. FLESH-EATER Although Gallimimus has in the past been thought of as a herbivorous (plant-eating) dinosaur, some scientists have suggested that it was more carnivorous (flesh-eating) than herbivorous, and its grasping hand was probably used for catching small animals. Gallimimus could have snapped up large insects and their larvae, perhaps small vertebrates (animals with a backbone), and anything else it could swallow whole. RIVERBANK HABITAT Gallimimus lived deeper inland than its North American cousins, in a climate that was drier overall but in which droughts and rainy seasons alternated. The ornithomimid walked along the banks of rivers, perhaps in company with plant-eating duckbills, armored dinosaurs, and sauropods ("lizard-footed" dinosaurs). With its head carried high above its narrow shoulders, Gallimimus scanned the land, alert to the threat posed by carnivores. RAPID ESCAPE Gallimimus' enemies might have included tyrannosaurids and Deinocheirus, a strange theropod known only from huge, gangling forelimbs armed with formidable claws. Gallimimus' only defense against such large, hungry predators was to run away, increasing stride as it gained speed - possibly running as fast as a modern-day ostrich.
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