Fossil points to fruit-eating dinosaur the size of a turkey
The species Infernogallus jamesi had jaw muscles capable of processing soft plants and fruit.
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Researchers in the United States have described fossils of a small, toothless dinosaur that probably ate fruit. The discovery offers new clues about the varied feeding strategies of dinosaurs at the end of the Cretaceous.
The researchers describe Infernogallus jamesi as a new species that lived about 66 million years ago. They located the fossils in Montana and North Dakota, in rocks from the Hell Creek Formation. The animal was about 1.5 metres long and is estimated to have weighed 11 to 12 kilograms, roughly the weight of a large turkey.
The researchers reconstructed the skull using CT scans. They saw that the palate and the attachment of the jaw muscles allowed a movement mainly forwards and backwards. This enabled the dinosaur to break down soft foods, comparable to the way some modern birds process fruit.
The researchers classify Infernogallus among the caenagnathids, a group of feathered theropods without teeth that they place evolutionarily close to birds. This makes the discovery relevant to the question of how different feeding patterns arose within the branch of dinosaurs from which birds evolved.
The authors call the species the first known dinosaur with clear adaptations to a specialised fruit diet. That does not mean that other dinosaurs never ate fruit. According to the authors, this is the first time a combination of fossil features has been found in a species that convincingly supports such a diet.
The study goes beyond the menu of a single animal. Flowering plants expanded significantly during the Cretaceous and produced new food sources. The researchers suggest that fruit-eating dinosaurs may have dispersed seeds, but that broader ecological consequences remain a hypothesis. The research has been published in Nature Communications and is based on fossil material and anatomical reconstructions, not on direct observation of feeding behaviour.
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The scientific core of the article has been confirmed by the university involved, Reuters and the publication reference. Interpretations concerning seed dispersal are explicitly presented as a hypothesis.
- confirmed Infernogallus jamesi was about 1.5 metres long and weighed approximately 11 to 12 kilograms. — Reuters and Stony Brook Medicine cite these estimates. source
- confirmed The skull showed adaptations for processing soft food such as fruit. — The CT reconstruction and jaw muscles are described by Stony Brook Medicine. source
- confirmed The species is the first known dinosaur with clear adaptations to a fruit diet. — The claim appears in Reuters' account of the research. source
Editor's note
The fossils, species name and anatomical interpretation have been described by the university and Reuters. The possible role as a seed disperser is an inference by the researchers and not a directly proven ecosystem function.Sources
- Strange beaked ‘hell chicken’ is the first fruit-eating dinosaur — Reuters
- Stony Brook Paleontologist Dinosaur Discovery Reveals a Specialized Fruit Eater — Stony Brook Medicine
- Infernogallus jamesi. Fruit-eating adaptations in a Late Cretaceous oviraptorosaur — Nature Communications
More on this in Dutch media
- De Telegraaf — „dinosauriërs fossielen”
- AD — „dinosauriërs fossielen”
- de Volkskrant — „dinosauriërs fossielen”