What are some examples of dinosaurs that weighed roughly 75lbs?

November 29, 2022 7:16 PM

My four year old son loves dinosaurs and loves our dog, Bailey. He asked me what dinos were the same size as our dog. She weighs 75lbs (but has been as high as 90lbs). I was able to find some dinosaurs that were about the same size as an adult human and velociraptors I knew to be around 40lbs, same as a medium sized dog. But I can't seem to find any examples there were between those two. Any paleontologists or dinosaur enthusiasts know of any?
posted by VTX to Science & Nature (8 answers total)

Homalocephale is listed at 106 bs, and Texacephale is listed as 88 lbs, but I don't know how good a source that site is. It seems oddly precise for prehistoric animal weight!
posted by lapis at 7:42 PM on November 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

Suskityrannus is listed in Wikipedia as 44–88 lb.

Various searches are describing why it's hard to estimate dinosaur mass, so you might also think about length/height, as that's more evident from fossils.
posted by lapis at 7:46 PM on November 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Bagaceratops was just a little larger than a labrador, and according to the fossil record was a very good boy. A few of the protoceratopsids are about in this size range.
posted by phunniemee at 7:51 PM on November 29, 2022 [17 favorites]

Best answer: Not a direct answer, but your question immediately reminded me of the card game Cardline: Dinosaurs, where you are attempting to put dinosaurs into order based on either weight or length.

You might get a number of options by flipping through that deck of cards. (Sadly, I've only played a friend's copy, so can't search them for you...)
posted by Metasyntactic at 8:52 PM on November 29, 2022 [2 favorites]

Side note: I don't think those weights are oddly precise, 88 pounds is equivalent to a nice round 40 kg, for example. I.e. the source probably used metric. Of course, that doesn't tell you anything more about the source reliability.
posted by snusmumrik at 2:44 AM on November 30, 2022 [3 favorites]

Best answer: Lystrosaurus was a unique medium/small dinosaur which bridged the Permian extinction event when pigs ruled the earth.
posted by ovvl at 4:31 AM on November 30, 2022 [2 favorites]

Best answer: May I just say what an interesting question this is, and how much I look forward to seeing the doggo dino costume at some point!
posted by winesong at 2:49 PM on November 30, 2022 [3 favorites]

Response by poster: Thank you for all the wonderful answers and comments. This was proving very difficult to answer! I thought it would be a good one for ask.me and the hive mind did NOT disappoint!

I'll leave it open in case anyone else happens upon the thread before it locks itself.

The Boy asked today what dinos were bigger than his friend Audry's house. That was a lot easier to answer. Lots of examples of taller and/or longer but none as massive!
posted by VTX at 7:25 PM on December 2, 2022