''Odaxosaurus'' is an extinct

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

anguid Anguidae refers to a large and diverse family of lizards native to the Northern Hemisphere. Common characteristics of this group include a reduced supratemporal arch, striations on the medial faces of tooth crowns, osteoderms, and a lateral fold ...

lizard Lizards are a widespread group of squamate reptiles, with over 7,000 species, ranging across all continents except Antarctica, as well as most oceanic island chains. The group is paraphyletic since it excludes the snakes and Amphisbaenia alt ...

s that existed in western North America from the

Late Cretaceous The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous Period is divided in the geologic time scale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous Series. The Cretaceous is named after ''creta'', the ...

to the

Paleocene The Paleocene, ( ) or Palaeocene, is a geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 66 to 56 mya (unit), million years ago (mya). It is the first epoch of the Paleogene Period (geology), Period in the modern Cenozoic Era (geology), E ...

. Fossils of the

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

''Odaxosaurus piger'' and the species ''O. priscus'' are widespread throughout Late Cretaceous formations in the western United States and Canada. First described in 1928 from the Lance Formation in Wyoming, ''O. piger'' has since been found in the Hell Creek Formation in Wyoming and Montana, the Frenchman and Scollard formations in Alberta, and the

Aguja Formation The Aguja Formation is a geological formation in North America, exposed in Texas, United States and Chihuahua and Coahuila in Mexico, whose strata date back to the Late Cretaceous. Dinosaur remains are among the fossils that have been recovered f ...

in Texas. It was one of the few species of lizards to survive the

Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event The Cretaceous–Paleogene (K–Pg) extinction event (also known as the Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction) was a sudden mass extinction of three-quarters of the plant and animal species on Earth, approximately 66 million years ago. With the ...

, which is estimated to have killed off 83% of all lizard species. The second species, ''O. priscus'', was named in 1996 from the Dinosaur Park Formation in Alberta and has since been found in the Kaiparowits Formation in southern Utah. Remains of an anguid from the Kirtland Formation in New Mexico may also belong to ''Odaxosaurus''.

References

Cretaceous lizards Late Cretaceous lepidosaurs of North America Paleocene reptiles of North America Fossil taxa described in 1928 Laramie Formation {{paleo-lizard-stub