Othnielia was a small herbivorous ornithopod dinosaur that lived 150 to 140 million years ago, in the Late Jurassic. It was discovered in the late 1800s by men working for Othniel Charles Marsh, for whom it was soon named after. Ironically, Othnielia‘s closest relative, Drinker, was named for Marsh's archrival, Edward Drinker Cope. Recently, the type specimen of Othnelia was deemed nondiagnostic, meaning the animal portrayed in the novel is the animal now known as Othnielosaurus.
Old drawing showing Othnielia as half-arboreal
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Jurassic Park (novel)
Othnielia was seen in the novel version of Jurassic Park. It lives side by side with its relative Dryosaurus in the Hypsilophodon Highlands. Before the InGen Incident, an Othnielia got its neck stuck in between the branches of a tree where it died of suffocation. The park hosted a population of 23 Othnielia.[1]
Othnielia is portrayed as a half-arboreal herbivore, a view about the smaller ornithopods that has recently been disproved. Because the Othys spend so much time in the trees they were impossible to accurately track with the motion sensors. They're always jumping their fences. This explains why there are so much more Othys than expected. The expected population was 16, but there are 23.
It apparently had a colour similar to that of the novel's Velociraptors, as when Tim saw a Velociraptor in the Othnielia paddock, the adults thought he had mistaken an Othnielia for a raptor.[2]
Later in the novel Muldoon states that the Othnelia scavenged on the Hadrosaurus HD/09. [3]
In The Lost World, Ian Malcolm hears jumping in the jungle trees, and when the group thinks monkeys, Malcolm disagrees. It is probably Othielia hopping throughout the foliage.
Jurassic Park inspired games
Othnielia from Jurassic Park III: Park Builder.
- Othnielia appears in Jurassic Park III: Park Builder. It is nr. 75 of the Herbivore Ones.
Sources
- ↑ Jurassic Park (novel), Control, page 154.
- ↑ Jurassic Park (novel), Control, page 165.
- ↑ Jurassic Park (novel), Search, page 272.