"Kai"
Erlikosaurus andrewsi
"Andrew's Erlik lizard"

This is a headshot of a therizinosaur, based primarily (with alterations) on the skull of Erlikosaurus. There is a good deal of debate over how the heads of these animals would have appeared in life, and having looked at all the arguments, this is my own take on it. Pores and ridges indicate the presence of a beak covering the tip of the snout - one piece of evidence previously used to place segnosaurs in the ornithiscia. However beaks seem to be a shared characteristic among enigmosaurs (the group including caudipterygids, oviraptors, and therizinosaurs). Feathers are common to all maniraptors, but due to it's gigantic size, my Erlikosaurus only has a light fuzz on it's head and neck, with longer feathers down the back and a display crest atop the head. A plant eater, Erliksaurus had leaf-shaped teeth lining it's jaw. However, they are inset to a much higher degree than other theropods, indicating the presence of some kind of cheek structure. Since they lacked facial muscles, dinosaur cheeks were probably not large and fleshy like those of mammals. Instead, most reconstruct them as flaps of muscle inset to the jaw, so the line of the mouth remains visible. Lacrimal horns seem to have also been present, drawn here as an extension of the beak, and the jaws are covered in typical dinosaurian scales. Facial markings after Brunnen-G.

Erlikosaurus lived in Mongolia during the Cenemonian - Turnonian Ages of the Late Cretaceous. Therizinosaurus itself lived later, during the Campanian, 70 million years ago. The community of animals coexisting at this time is very well known. Therizinosaurus would have lived along side dinosaurs like Velociraptor, Protoceratops, Oviraptor, Citipati, Deinocheirus, and Tarbosaurus.