Torvosaurus juvenile chasing Othnielia
(This drawing was done last year and it was done with colored pastel chalk.)
Torvosaurus juvenile chasing Othnielia
Torvosaurus was probably the biggest predator of the late Jurassic Period. A very few years ago a large specimen was found near the Utah-Colorado border. It included the skull. I spoke with a paleontologist involved in the excavation. He told me that when this monster was alive it was 36 feet long, 11 feet tall, and probably weighed around 5 tons or 10,000 pounds. That is one big animal. It had a proportionally bigger head than Allosaurus. But there is some evidence that Allosaurs could get to be just over 40 feet long. Since they lived at the same time in the same part of the world, they certainly were rivals. By the way, another species of Torvosaurus was found in Portugal. In Europe, during the Jurassic Period, Torvosaurus was the biggest predator of all.
The Pterosaur or flying reptile in this drawing is in the foreground. It is a type of Rhamphorinchus and it would have a wingspan that would be about 2 meters wide. This drawing is of a juvenile Torvosaurus of about 14 feet in length. That would be around 4 meters long. The small herbivore that was chased and is trapped at the edge of the cliff is called Othnielia. It was about 1.5-2 meters long or between 5 and 6.5 feet long. Notice that the Othnielia is well camouflaged for desert life. The Torvosaurus is depicted as an ambush predator that would hide in the trees, hence the green coloring.
On the Torvosaurus in this drawing... I want to again point out that this Torvosaurus can't be an adult. An adult would have a bigger size by a lot. It would be 22 feet longer than this young Torvosaurus that was hunting in the desert. Also, note that this young predator is not filled in and heavily built. We have found, over the years, both young and adult Theropods, and several stages in between. It appears that the younger Theropods are much built much lighter. They could probably run faster too.
About the background... it is based on the actual area where Torvosaurus was found in North America. Now, that is not necessarily what Eastern Utah, Western Colorado area looked like 145 million years ago. For the early and mid-Jurassic Period that area was mostly desert. During the late Jurassic it was more of a flood plain. So maybe this drawing is from a desert area on the edge of the flood plain. My wife and I went on a BYU Geology Alumni field trip to this area to look at a dig site that had dinosaurs from the period BEFORE the Jurassic. These Triassic dinosaurs included Coelophysis and we saw both dino tracks and a skull embedded in the rock. It was pretty cool!
The printable version of the coloring page is found by clicking on the Paleontology or All Printable button up top. Scroll down to find the new drawing. The color picture that I did in pastel chalk is not available as a printable. This color drawing is actually only a photo of my drawing that is hanging on the wall at my house. Have fun coloring. Below are a few other coloring pages of Torvosaurus. Some of these drawings below are not as anatomically accurate because they were drawn BEFORE the skull of Torvosaurus was found. My friend, the paleontologist, liked the flattened shape of the skull in my new drawings. By the way, the big one that they found is now at the Cincinnati Science Museum. And a final thought, feel free to to use my color drawing as a guide for the coloring the coloring page drawing. And on a Geology note... the things that look like paint stains on the cliff are magnesium stains as magnesium precipitates out of the rock.
Torvosaurus vs Allosaurus
Torvosaurus on the Prowl
Torvosaurus as a feathered Theropod
(We don't know if it had feathers... but maybe it did. Maybe ALL Theropods had feathers.)
Torvosaurus and Ramphorhynchus
(Notice that the skull is not flattened. This was drawn before a skull for Torvosaurus was found.).
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