The fossil of the new species called Australornis lovei was found in the Waipara greensand deposits of North Canterbury on New Zealand’s South Island and dates from Paleocene age, making it about 58 million years old.
It was formed in the deep waters off the coast of Zealandia, the continental fragment that New Zealand rests upon, shortly after the event that caused the mass extinction of the dinosaurs and many marine organisms, said a statement from Canterbury Museum.
Australornis, named after amateur fossil collector Leigh Love who discovered it, appears to be similar to two species described from the late Cretaceous (around 70 million years ago) of the Antarctic Peninsula and highlights the links between Antarctica and New Zealand in the late Cretaceous and early Paleocene, according to scientists from Canterbury Museum and Germany’s Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum.
“This new species is important in our understanding of bird evolution because although there are a number of bird groups described from the late Cretaceous, most belong to groups not present on earth today,” said Dr Paul Scofield of Canterbury Museum.
Dr Gerald Mayr of the Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum said the find is exciting. “We hope to find more material of this pivotal species to enable a better understanding of its relationships and too allow us to better understand early avian evolution.”
Image credit: Derek Onley (via Canterbury Museum)
