Ischioceratops

Ischioceratops Temporal range: 69 Ma PreЄ Є O S D C P T J K Pg N ↓
Holotype
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Reptilia
Superorder:	Dinosauria
Order:	Ornithischia
Infraorder:	Ceratopsia
Family:
Genus:	Ischioceratops
Binomial name
Ischioceratops zhuchengensis He et al., 2015

Ischioceratops is an extinct genus of small ceratopsian dinosaur that lived approximately 69 million years ago during the latter part of the Cretaceous Period in what is now China. Ischioceratops was a small sized, moderately-built, ground-dwelling, quadrupedal herbivore, whose total body length has been estimated to about 2 meters. The ceratopsians were a group of dinosaurs with parrot-like beaks which fed on vegetation and thrived in North America and Asia during the Cretaceous Period, which ended approximately 66 million years ago, at which point they all became extinct. Its name refers to the peculiar shape of the ischiatic bones.

Ischioceratops existed in the Wangshi Group during the late Cretaceous. It lived alongside centrosaurines, saurolophines, and tyrannosaurines. The most common creatures in the formation were Sinoceratops and Zhuchengtyrannus.

Ischioceratops is one of the few ceratopsian dinosaurs which is not known by the skull. The most peculiar traits were located in the ischium, which shows a unique morphology. Another characteristic of Ischioceratops was the presence of a caudal elevation in its proximal part, which is present also in , Koreaceratops and in a more similar way in Montanoceratops and Cerasinops. The taxon has been referred to and distinguished from other known leptoceratopsids based on the following combination of characters: nine sacral vertebrae, more than in any other known basal (non-ceratopsid) ceratopsian but fewer than in ceratopsids; the ischium has a robust shaft that resembles that of a recurved bow and flares gradually to form a subrectangular-shaped obturator process in its middle portion. An elliptical fenestra perforates the obturator process.