Ornitholestes was a small theropod dinosaur of the Late Jurassic period. In 1990 it was the first theropod dinosaur discovered in the 20th century, found in the Bone Cabin Quarry near Medicine Bow, Wyoming. It was first described and named by American paleontologist Henry F. Osborn in 1903. The skull was complete although crushed when it was found. It had jagged teeth and a small horn on its nose. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was a bipedal carnivore, whose head was proportionally smaller than that of most predatory dinosaurs. It was a fast bipedal runner during its time. Its skull was huge with a short snout and a robust lower jaw. It had relatively large eye sockets that measured more than 25 percent of the skull length. The front teeth of Ornitholestes were described to be somewhat conical, with reduced dentitions, while the back teeth were cropped and sharper. Ornitholestes fed on small lizards, and on carrion left over from larger carnivores or fish taken from lakes and rivers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ornitholestes was about 2 m long from snout to tail and weighed about 12 kg.<\/p>\n\n\n\n