Leptochamops
Name:
Leptochamops.
Phonetic: Lep-toe-cham-ops.
Named By: Charles W. Gilmore - 1928.
Classification: Chordata, Reptilia, Squamata.
Species: L. denticulatus
(type), L. thrinax.
Diet: Insectivore.
Size: Roughly 30 centimetres long.
Known locations: Canada, Alberta &
Saskatchewan. USA, Montana, New Mexico, Utah &
Wyoming.
Time period: Santonian to Maastrichtian of the
Cretaceous.
Fossil representation: Specimens of Many individuals.
The
fairly
high number of Leptochamops specimens so far found
suggests that this
would have been a fairly common little lizard in the late Cretaceous
ecosystems of North America. Like with many modern lizard today,
Leptochamops was probably a fairly small predator
of invertebrates
while it tried to keep out of the predatory scope of dromaeosaurid
dinosaurs such as Saurornitholestes.
In
2012 two lower jaw
fragments that were previously assigned to the type species L.
denticulatus were found to be different. These were used
to create a
new genus, Obamadon,
so named after the 44th president of the
United States of America, Barack Obama, however the name was not
formalised as valid until 2013.
Further reading
- Fossil vertebrates from the Late Cretaceous Lance Formation,
eastern Wyoming, R. Estes - 1964.
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