Posted on 02/01/2025 11:32:15 PM PST by Red Badger
A bizarre new genus and species of ornithomimid dinosaur has been identified from the fossilized remains found in 2014 in Coahuila, Mexico.
Life reconstruction of Mexidracon longimanus. Image credit: Ddinodan / CC BY 4.0.
The newly-identified dinosaur species roamed Earth during the Late Cretaceous epoch, some 73 million years ago.
Named Mexidracon longimanus, the ancient creature was around 3 m (10 feet) in length.
It belongs to Ornithomimidae, a family of theropod dinosaur that evolved a toothless beak and were likely omnivorous or herbivorous, superficially resembling living ostriches.
“Ornithomimosaurs are a clade of ostrich-like theropod dinosaurs characterized by relatively small and delicate skulls with large orbits, long necks, elongated forelimbs with non-raptorial manus and long cursorial hindlimbs,” said Dr. Claudia Inés Serrano-Brañas, a paleontologist at Smithsonian Institution, the Universidad de Ciencias Geológicas y Sociales and the Benemérita Escuela Normal de Coahuila, and her colleagues from the United States, Mexico and Spain.
“Body size can range from small forms (over 12 kg), such as Nqwebasaurus thwazi and Hexing qingyi from the Early Cretaceous of Africa and Asia, respectively, to the large Late Cretaceous Asian species Deinocheirus mirificus (6 tons).”
“Ornithomimosaurs are known from Cretaceous geological formations in Europe, Asia, North America and Africa.”
The fossils of Mexidracon longimanus were discovered in 2014 in the Cerro del Pueblo Formation in Mexico.
“The Cerro del Pueblo Formation in the state of Coahuila represents one of the richest dinosaur-bearing formations from Mexico,” the researchers said.
“As in other Upper Cretaceous formations of North America and Asia, ornithomimosaur remains are quite common in the Cerro del Pueblo Formation.”
“However, the majority of these specimens are highly fragmentary, and even relatively complete specimens have not been formally described.”
“Mexidracon longimanus represents the second ornithomimosaur and the first ornithomimid dinosaur species formally described from the Cerro del Pueblo Formation.”
The most conspicuous autapomorphy of the new species is the extreme lengthening of its metacarpus, the bones that form the palm.
“The finding of Mexidracon longimanus adds to the increasing diversity and paleobiogeographic distribution of the group during the Campanian of southern Laramidia,” the scientists said.
“The ornithomimosaur record of the Cerro del Pueblo Formation represents yet another instance of the coexistence of ornithomimids and deinocheirids spanning a wide range of body sizes within this clade of ‘ostrich’ dinosaurs.”
The discovery of Mexidracon longimanus is reported in a paper published this week in the journal Cretaceous Research.
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Claudia Inés Serrano-Brañas et al. A long-handed new ornithomimid dinosaur from the Campanian (Upper Cretaceous) Cerro del Pueblo Formation, Coahuila, Mexico. Cretaceous Research, published online January 28, 2025; doi: 10.1016/j.cretres.2025.106087
Tastes like chicken PinGGG!..............
Looks like AOC.
You just want to date her. Everybody does
/s
Pard in my younger days I’d try to hit anything but stupid wasn’t working in the long run. 53 years ago I found a smart one that was better looking than that and married her. Now looking back I should have kept chasing stupid. I can’t win an argument. At least she likes Trumpy. Regards.
There you go!! 👌😂
I bet it smells better.
Can’t say for sure but I’d bet your right.
A quick thought. It looks like a buzzard. Ever look at them close? They spread their wings like that and they will land in an old bare tree, they like the old piss elm in Missouri. They land in the summer, especially August and sit and spread their wings in the breeze to stay cool. They are the best cleanup crew on the planet. Oops, road kill on route 9 no problem. This dude gotta be the predecessor to buzzards, AOC, and Nancy. Just saying.
Thanks Red Badger. The wetnap that comes with it is the size of a bedsheet.
“ were likely omnivorous or herbivorous”
Wow that is some serious “sciencing” going on their.
“ todays weather may rain or not rain, be warm or not warm, back to you Jim”😎😂🦆
Bkmk
Quetzalcoatl?
Imagine those things running around in Australia pecking at you.
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