(ORDO NEWS) — After scientists discovered a new species of bird that lived about 68 million years ago, their idea of ​​birds of that time completely changed. The ancient species was named Falcatakely forsteri. Found the remains of a bird by accident. At first, experts missed the ancient fossil and only after the computed tomography did they realize that they needed to pay attention to it.
As it turned out, the scythe-like beak is very similar to the toucan’s beak, but it belongs to a completely different species of bird. Scientists have never encountered this species before.
Patrick O’Connor shared that all birds that lived between 250-65 million years ago had approximately the same beaks. The discovered species has a huge number of differences from those that were found earlier. The bird’s skull is made up of bones that closely resemble the bones of modern animals. The skeleton is also not very bird-like. It can be compared to a theropod dinosaur.
It was quite difficult to establish such features. The first fossil was collected in 2010 in Madagascar. Seven years later, experts finally became interested in the find. But due to the fact that the beak and skull were incredibly fragile, they could not be removed for research. I had to use digital modeling and virtually study bones.
Then the turn came to 3D printers. With their help, the skull was restored and it turned out to be compared with other species. An interesting discovery was that a tooth remained in the beak. There were many more of them. Due to these features, the bird even acquires a somewhat comical profile. It is enough to imagine a small toothy toucan to understand what the ancient bird looked like.
Scientists know about 200 bird species of that time and none of them has the same skull as Falcatakely forsteri.
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