Who doesn’t love a classic movie about dinosaurs? Enjoying these movies is a fun way to watch prehistoric beasts on the big screen. Animated flicks such as The Land Before Time are classics that many people enjoyed watching as children. While this ‘80s movie awakens childhood nostalgia, it isn’t accurate in dino-knowledge. Below, we’ve detailed the top things The Land Before Time got wrong about dinosaurs and dispelled these inaccuracies.

They Couldn’t Have Been Friends

As touching as the friendship between the dinosaurs in the movie appears, it was physically impossible to ever occur due to when each species lived, as shown below:

• Littlefoot the Apatosaurus: 161.2 to 145 million years ago
• Cera the Triceratops: 83.5 to 66 million years ago
• Ducky the Parasaurolophus: 65 to 98 million years ago
• Petrie the Pteranodon: 89.8 to 70.6 million years ago
• Spike the Stegosaurus:155 to 150 million years ago

While these dinosaurs lived millions of years apart, many of the characters did exist in similar geographic regions across the Western part of North America.

The Look of a Parasaurolophus

There are also various inaccuracies surrounding the character Ducky. While the movies usually consider her a Parasaurolophus, her physical appearance looks more like a Saurolophus. The Parasaurolophus had a crest on its head that went down the entire body. However, Ducky only has a ridge on the back of her head, similar to Saurolophus.

It’s also worth noting that even if Ducky were a Parasaurolophus, it’s unlikely she’d swim like she does in the movies since these dinosaurs only lived on land. There is no research that hints that the Parasaurolophus could or would swim.

The Parent-Child Relationship

All the characters have a very close, nurturing relationship with their parents, but this wasn’t the case with most dinosaurs. While some of these beasts did care for their young, specific species like sauropods—Littlefoot— most likely didn’t care for their young.

Scientists believe it’s more likely that these long-necked dinosaurs moved on after laying their eggs, as many sauropods buried theirs. Animals we see today, such as turtles, also exhibit this behavior and don’t raise their young.

What It Got Right

While there are many facts that The Land Before Time got wrong about dinosaurs, one thing it got right was that many dinosaur species were fairly intelligent. Additionally, some of these beasts were more social than others and lived in herds. However, unlike the movies, these herds most likely included beasts of the same species.

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