News in Paleontology: Baby Bird in Amber
- Clarence Tan Adapted from Kristin Romey (Nat Geo)
- Jun 9, 2017
- 2 min read
Following the recent news of a dinosaur tail found in Burmese amber, this study had to beat the previous one with something even more sensational. This time, the study showed a baby bird trapped in amber about 99 million years of age.
The remains of a baby bird from the time of the dinosaurs have been discovered in a specimen of 99-million-year-old amber, according to scientists writing in the journal Gondwana Research.
The hatchling belonged to a major group of birds known as enantiornithes, which went extinct along with dinosaurs at the end of the Cretaceous period, about 65 million years ago. Funded in part by the National Geographic Society's Expeditions Council, this discovery is providing critical new information about these ancient, toothed birds and how they differed from modern birds.
This is also the most complete fossil yet to be discovered in Burmese amber. Mined in the Hukawng Valley in northern Myanmar, Burmese amber deposits contain possibly the largest variety of animal and plant life from the Cretaceous period, which lasted from 145.5 to 65.5 million years ago.
The fossilized specimen was purchased in Myanmar in 2014 by Guang Chen, director of the Hupoge Amber Museum in Tengchong City, China, after he had heard about an amber sample with a strange "lizard claw" inclusion. Chen brought the sample to research team co-leader Lida Xing of the China University of Geosciences, who identified the claw as an enantiornithine foot. Additional imaging of the specimen revealed the remarkable extent of preservation obscured behind thick layers of amber, carbonized plant remains, and clay-filled bubbles.\
"[I thought we had] just a pair of feet and some feathers before it underwent CT imaging. It was a big, big, big surprise after that," says Xing.
"The surprise continued when we started examining the distribution of feathers and and realized that there were translucent sheets of skin that connected many of the body regions appearing in the CT scan data," adds team co-leader Ryan McKellar of the Royal Saskatchewan Museum.
'Belone' is currently on display at the Hupoge Amber Museum and will travel to the Shanghai Museum of Natural History for a special exhibit between June 24th and the end of July 2017.
This is one of the most exciting discoveries this year in 2017 in the paleontology world. While many are still obsessing over the small 3 inch specimens of scaled T-rex skin fossils, I personally feel that this discovery is way more interesting and significant. In truth I am probably more biased because of my love and fascination for burmese ambers. These ambers have never once let me down. Every single time there seem to be newer and more interesting discoveries to be found here. From a partial feathered dinosaur tail, a partial hatchling bird wing to this 75% complete baby bird. My adventure to this land of opportunities in Myanmar may just begin soon enough as I'm going to have a chance to work there in the foreseeable future. Hopefully with the lackluster interest of the amber market, I'm still able to get amber cheap and hopefully score one of these babies myself!
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