A dinosaur possessing hundreds of teeth seems like a creature of pure fantasy, but the fossil record reveals that one ancient herbivore developed a specialized mouth. This unique anatomical feature, which involved a constant cycle of tooth replacement, allowed the animal to efficiently process the tough, low-lying vegetation of its environment. Scientists have long been fascinated by how such a complex dental system evolved, completely reshaping the feeding strategy of this long-necked dinosaur. The secret lies in how the teeth were organized and replaced throughout the creature’s life.
Identifying the 500-Toothed Dinosaur and How to Say Its Name
The dinosaur famous for having approximately 500 teeth is Nigersaurus taqueti. This unusual creature was a member of the sauropod group, which includes other long-necked plant-eaters, though Nigersaurus was relatively small for its kind. It was formally named and described in 1999 by paleontologist Paul Sereno and his colleagues.
The genus name, Nigersaurus, is a direct reference to the location where it was discovered, the Republic of Niger in Africa. The species name, taqueti, honors the French paleontologist Philippe Taquet, who was the first to find some of the initial remains in the region. For pronunciation, the name is typically broken down phonetically as Nee-zhair-sore-us tah-kett-eye.
Understanding the Tooth Battery System
The high count of over 500 teeth in Nigersaurus was not due to all of them being active at once, but rather to a sophisticated system of constant replacement known as a dental or tooth battery. This dinosaur’s jaw contained approximately 60 columns of teeth in the lower jaw and 68 columns in the upper jaw. Each of these columns held one functional tooth at the surface and a stack of up to nine replacement teeth developing beneath it.
At any given moment, only about 50 to 60 teeth were actively in use, but the total number of teeth present in the jaws, including all the replacement teeth, reached the high count of around 500. This rapid replacement mechanism was one of the fastest of any known dinosaur, with each tooth being replaced roughly every 14 days.
The teeth themselves were small, peg-like, and positioned in a straight line across a remarkably broad, square-shaped muzzle. This unique jaw structure was rotated transversely, meaning the teeth were set far forward and sideways. This allowed the dinosaur to crop low-lying vegetation, such as ferns and horsetails, across a wide area close to the ground, leading to its nickname, the “Mesozoic cow”.
Where and When This Unique Creature Lived
Nigersaurus taqueti lived during the Early Cretaceous period, approximately 115 to 105 million years ago. Although it belonged to the sauropod group, it was relatively small compared to its gigantic relatives, measuring about 30 feet (9 meters) long and weighing around 4 tons.
The fossils were discovered in the Gadoufaoua region of the Elrhaz Formation, located in the Republic of Niger in West Africa. During the Early Cretaceous, this area—now part of the Sahara Desert—was a lush, riverine habitat characterized by floodplains and abundant plant life.
This habitat was shared with other large dinosaurs, including the sail-backed predator Suchomimus and the iguanodontian Ouranosaurus. Later expeditions in the 1990s unearthed the most complete specimens, allowing researchers to fully reconstruct the bizarre skull and understand its feeding mechanism.