Baby Bird from Time of Dinosaurs Found Fossilized in Amber. The 99-million-year-old hatchling from the Cretaceous Period is the best preserved of its kind.

From National Geographic

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.

Read more: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/06/baby-bird-dinosaur-burmese-amber-fossil/

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