With a bright green dinosaur tail strapped to his back, Benjamin McGraner romped through the Burke Museum, tussling with other likewise clad youngsters celebrating Dinosaur Day.

Some were wearing purple claws; others sported headdresses. "Roar," screamed one girl as she whacked another with her stuffed tail. "I'm the Queen Dinosaur," said another, with a yellow hood atop her head.

"I love dinosaurs," said Benjamin, 6, who said the costume he was wearing was an ankylosaurus, a huge armored dinosaur, his favorite.

His son has been into dinosaurs since he was 3, said Benjamin's father, Patrick. "He can name a couple hundred dinosaurs."

Hundreds of children and their parents flocked to the Burke Museum at the University of Washington on Saturday to learn about dinosaurs by drawing pictures, walking in their stride and touching fossils.

Children were able to look at the feather imprints of the 150-million-year-old fossil archaeopteryx. They listened as scientists showed a dinosaur tailbone found in the Sahara Desert and an ancient tooth from a crocodile.

Tables of dinosaur bones and other dinosaur-era animals were spread throughout the museum. Youngsters crowded into one room where they could take the Dinosaur Walk, footprints glued to the floor that compared strides among dinosaurs, birds and humans.

Tyrannosaurus Rex is his favorite dinosaur, said Wilder, 6, as he traced it onto paper. "I like the ancient creatures the best," he said.

Susan Gilmore: 206-464-2054 or sgilmore@seattletimes.com