# 66.7 million-year-old "Wonderchicken"



## Timeshifter (Apr 26, 2021)

Yep, here's another. This should put a lol into you during these bizzare times...

'The 66.7 million-year-old "Wonderchicken" sounds like a thing with the size of a building that can blast things with laser vision (or something like that). While it couldn’t do that, this extinct creature was found to have the best-preserved skull of any bird fossil and is the oldest modern bird skull ever found—meaning, a legit bird and not a feathered dinosaur. It is also demystifying not just the origin of modern birds, but why these birds made it through the mass extinction that ended up obliterating Godzilla-size dinosaurs'

'Fossils of any bird from the late Cretaceous are rare. How modern birds emerged was something that remained buried with Wonderchicken until now. What is even more amazing is that the skull of this incredibly preserved fossil was easily recognizable to Field and his research team as a *modern bird skull (perhaps bacause thats what it is)* never mind the oldest neornithine (modern bird) skull known to exist. Hi-res X-ray CT scans revealed an almost sci-fi mashup of a chicken and a duck that was part of the group Galloanserae, which includes fowl like chickens, ducks, quails, and other similar species.

'Wonderchicken was unearthed in Maastricht, the Netherlands, which gave the team unprecedented evidence that Europe was one of the most important regions associated with modern bird evolution.

Prehistoric birds are thought to have evolved from therapod dinosaurs sometime during the Jurassic period, *around 165-150 million *years ago, though some paleontologists beg to differ (lol) on what exactly separated them from feathered reptiles. Different species of proto-birds began to appear during the Jurassic and the Cretaceous. They were *eventually wiped out* (brilliant science that) and survived by modern birds, whose lightweight, hollow bones, winged bodies and often aerodynamic arrangement of feathers (there are a few flightless misfits) continued evolving into at least ten thousands of species over tens of millions of years'

Ludicrous proofs as ever

Thoughg to have
From around

With absolutes like that  who needs further proofs?



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## Archive (Apr 26, 2021)

> Note: This post was recovered from the Sh.org archive.Username: jd755Date: 2020-03-29 10:45:02Reaction Score: 1




Timeshifter said:


> Wonderchicken was unearthed in Maastricht, the Netherlands, which gave the team unprecedented evidence that Europe was one of the most important regions associated with modern bird evolution.


it's too funny, love the way they suggest via a cartoon the Netherlands was once a tropical beachside environment.
These people need to be taken out and given a good slap or once again sent to Rockall. Scary thing is they consider themselves to be superior to everyone else!


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## Archive (Apr 26, 2021)

> Note: This post was recovered from the Sh.org archive.Username: NovaFeedbackDate: 2020-03-29 13:12:40Reaction Score: 0


The only wonder is that it was not* 66.6* millions.


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## Archive (Apr 26, 2021)

> Note: This post was recovered from the Sh.org archive.Username: jd755Date: 2020-03-29 14:09:54Reaction Score: 0


It's a young seagull  in all but beak.


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