Ceratosaurus nasicornis
Dancin' for the ladies.
(In this vision) Found from North America to Europe, and possibly elsewhere, the ceratosaur is an opportunistic predator, hunting anything that it can get a hold of. It may wade in search for aquatic prey, such as fish, in wetland environments. With this lifestyle, the ceratosaur doesn’t have to compete with other local carnivores, such as the larger allosaurs and torvosaurs. Sexual dimorphism is a great contrast in this dinosaur, with the males appearing flamboyant with their blue heads, great namesake horns, wattles and inflatable air sacs, and much larger than the drabber females (who have shorter, black horns, a lack air sacs and wattles, and brown heads the same colour as their bodies). During the mating season, ceratosaurs gather in great, polygamous, lekking grounds spreading for huge distances across the desert. There, the males show off their visual flamboyance while "dancing", lifting their arms and tails of golden feathers, and booming by inflating their orange air sacs, trying to catch the attention of an inquisitive female. They may even squabble against eachother at times.
Ceratosaurus is such an underrepresented dinosaur. Because of how "uninteresting" it is among the general public compared to "bigger and badder" species, there is a big trend in popular culture where it’s either shown for only a little while doing almost nothing noteworthy, or getting mauled immediately by a larger dinosaur such as Allosaurus as stock fodder and nothing else, notably in the abysmal 2001 documentary When Dinosaurs Roamed America (not rewatching it). If Ceratosaurus is "uninteresting," then what’s even about its characteristic, horn-like crests? They do not seem to have been used for combat, rather as a display structure for attracting mates. Here’s where it gets fun. What if these crests, known from bone alone, would’ve been covered by keratinous sheath (not preserved in fossils) that would’ve made them even larger in life than we often think? To add even more to the attraction, inspired by birds such as sage grouse and greater prairie chickens, I reconstructed the male of the taxon as a polygynous, flamboyant animal, with a blue head of caruncles, a dangling wattle on the chin, and vibrant air sacs ("neck boobs" satirically according to some) that can be inflated, not to mention simple, golden protofeathers on the arms and tail, plus the courtship dance. You could call it here as the "entertainer of the Jurassic," couldn’t find a better word. Ceratosaurus is already interesting from what we definitely know, and it probably would’ve been even more interesting as shown here. The reason why this individual, based on the holotype for C. "dentisulcatus", is named C. nasicornis here, is because I am in the opinion that said specimen actually just an adult C. nasicornis. In fact, it’s the only Ceratosaurus adult known if I remember correctly.
Concept doodle I made at school almost a year ago.
