AGE:
Late Cretaceous (Late Campanian-Early Maastrichtian), Nemegt Formation,70 million years ago

SIZE:
5.5 metres long

MEANING OF NAME:
'Chicken mimic'

PRONUNCIATION:
Gal-ih-MIME-us

CLASSIFICATION:
THEROPODA: Ornithomimosauria; Ornithomimidae

Small carnivorous dinosaurs took on a variety of forms in the Late Cretaceous, evolving into modes of life in some cases well removed from a strictly carnivorous diet. Gallimimus bullatus was one of these, the largest of the ornithomimosaurs. Totally without teeth, it may well have been an omnivore, feeding on seeds, fruits as well as small vertebrates and large insects.

Gallimimus bullatus belongs to a family once called the Struthiomimidae, the 'ostrich mimics'. The structure of the limbs and tail suggests that like the ostriches, the struthiomimids, or ornithomimids as they are more properly known, were capable of running quite fast.