Cedrorestes Temporal range: Early Cretaceous, Barremian |
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Left ilium | |
Scientific classification | |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Reptilia |
Clade: | Dinosauria |
Order: | †Ornithischia |
Suborder: | †Ornithopoda |
Clade: | †Ankylopollexia |
Clade: | †Styracosterna |
Genus: |
†Cedrorestes Gilpin et al., 2007 |
Species: | †C. crichtoni |
Binomial name | |
Cedrorestes crichtoni Gilpin et al., 2007 |
Cedrorestes is a genus of iguanodontian dinosaur from the Early Cretaceous of Utah. It is based on an incomplete skeleton which was found in the Barremian-age Yellow Cat Member of the Cedar Mountain Formation.
Cedrorestes is based on DMNH 47994, a partial skeleton including rib fragments, a sacrum, the left ilium and a portion of the right, a right thighbone, the right third metatarsal, and fragments of ossified tendons. These remains were recovered from near the top of the Yellow Cat Member of the Cedar Mountain Formation, in east-central Utah. They were found scattered in a calcareous mudstone, and showed evidence of pre-burial damage, from weathering or trampling.
This genus can be told apart from other iguanodontian ornithopods by its combination of a tall ilium, as is present in Iguanodon-like ornithopods, with a large lateral bony process above and behind the acetabulum and joint surface for the ischium, as is seen in hadrosaurids. David Gilpin and his coauthors, who described the specimen, noted that the lateral process has been considered diagnostic for hadrosaurids, and interpreted the combination of anatomical characteristics in Cedrorestes as evidence that the genus was close to the division between hadrosaurids and iguanodontids. They placed their new genus in Hadrosauridae, as the earliest known hadrosaurid.