Apatosaurus

Apatosaurus is one of the most famous of the giant Jurassic plant-eaters. It was a huge, long-necked dinosaur, longer than two school buses and weighing as much as 7-13 elephants! If you look at older dinosaur books, you might not find Apatosaurus, but you will see "Brontosaurus". This was the name that was used for this dinosaur when the wrong head was mistakenly put on its body. For years, an Apatosaurus body stood with the head of Camarasaurus on the end of its neck. This was named Brontosaurus and was one of the most popular dinosaurs for many years. Recently, Brontosaurus has received it's own genus instead of being an alternative name for the Apatosaurus.

Apatosaurus is a fairly typical member of the diplodocid family - long neck, pillar-like legs, long tapering tail and enormous size. It had, like the other family members, peg-like teeth in a head that seemed very small for such a large creature. Compared to Diplodocus, Apatosaurus has a shorter, thicker neck, and a larger, heavier body. There is much speculation about how much these creatures needed to eat and how such a small head could ingest enough food to fuel such a large body. Some scientists have stated that these huge, small-headed creatures would have needed to eat every waking moment in order to provide enough food to keep such a large body alive. Apatosaurus seemed to have every adaptation needed for continuous eating, including having nostrils on the top of its head, so breathing would not interfere with eating.

In order to facilitate the processing of food, which it could not chew with its teeth. Apatosaurus probably swallowed stones that it kept in a gizzard similar to that found in a chicken. The tough plant fibers would spend time in the gizzard stewing and grinded up by the stones.

The Apatosaurus reaches full size in 10 years.

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Creation
Apatosaurus was recreated by InGen for the Masrani Global Corporation's Jurassic World, their new dinosaur zoo. Apatosaurus has gray skin with dark blue striping and dark tan on its underbelly and portions of its face.

Their herd lives in the Gallimimus Valley, alongside Stegosaurus, Gallimimus, and 100 other prehistoric species, which can be viewed during the park rides Cretaceous Cruise, Gyrosphere and Gallimimus Valley Safari.

Indominus rex
Five Apatosaurus were killed or severely injured by a rampaging Indominus rex.

Possible Recreation Before Jurassic World?
In, Ian and Kelly Malcom and Sarah Harding pass through the rib cage of a large dinosaur. Some fans believe this to be Apatosaurus and they are supported by the fact that scene 145 of the film script mentions apatosaurs among the skeletal remains. Though the femur does match Apatosaurus close to the rib cage matches Apatosaurus, the script also mentions apatosaurs in scene 42 when the InGen Hunters were capturing dinosaurs for Peter Ludlow, when in the final film Mamenchisaurus appears instead. This makes the existence of Apatosaurs on Isla Sorna uncertain. However, the inside of the Isla Nublar Field Lab has an x-ray of a skull of a member of Diplodocidae, the group of sauropods that Apatosaurus belongs to. Possibly hinting that Apatosaurs were indeed recreated before Masrani's dinosaur park Jurassic World.

Production and development
Scriptwriter David Koepp confused Brachiosaurus for Apatosaurus's old scientific Brontosaurus in scene 15 of the Jurassic Park script. Also in the film script, Apatosaurus is listed as one of the embryos that Dennis Nedry steals in scene 49.

Similar to the error in the Jurassic Park script, the Apatosaurus skull seen on the Jurassic World website does not belong to the dinosaur at all, rather it belongs to a brachiosaurid sauropod like Brachiosaurus.

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Jurassic Park
The Apatosaurus is the first dinosaur the endorsement team encounters in the first novel. After the visitors arrive at Isla Nublar they can see a herd of Apatosaurus down in the lagoon.

The herd of Apatosaurus consists of 17 members. The herd lives in the lagoon, nicknamed Sauropod Swamp,  side by side with Hadrosaurus and Maiasaura.

When Gerry Harding, Ellie Sattler and Gennaro are driving through the lagoon to the settlement, a herd of Apatosaurus is standing on the road. Dr. Harding explains that smaller animals can be scared away with a recorded T. rex roar, but not Apatosaurus. He also says that Apatosaurus has a motion-based amphibian vision.

Only 12 apatosaurs are left at the end of the novel. The remaining are all killed in the napalm bombing along with the rest of the dinosaurs.



The Lost World
By the time of the events of The Lost World the Apatosaurus also have regained the ability to reproduce. A herd of Apatosaurus lives in the river valley at the center of Isla Sorna.

The Apatosaurus herd lives in symbiosis with a herd of Parasaurolophus, which stays close to the Apatosaurus herd for protection. The Parasaurolophus have larger brains and therefore, a much better sight than the Apatosaurus. They can spot predators much easier. According to Dr. Richard Levine, they use their large tails for defense, as shown when Sarah and Kelly are trying to catch the raptor that took the key to Arby's cage, and have long necks to balance out the long tails, leaning their head forward and therefore, do not need a large heart to pump blood to the head.

This kind of symbiosis between large and smaller herbivores did indeed existed in the dinosaur age. If this behavior was genetically determined it is understandable that this behavior evolved so rapidly on the island. However, Apatosaurus and Parasaurolophus originate from different periods.

Although, this behavior could be learned that if the Apatosaurus knew that if the Parasaurolophus made a certain call and carnivores come up, they would be able to place the two together.
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Jurassic Park III: Park Builder
Apatosaurus is nr. 052 of the Herbivore Threes that can be created in Jurassic Park III: Park Builder.

Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis
Apatosaurus was originally going to be one of the dinosaurs that can be created in the video game Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis, but it was cut from the final product.

Jurassic Park: Builder
Apatosaurus is one of the available dinosaurs in the IOS application, Jurassic Park: Builder. It is listed under the synonym Brontosaurus.

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