Eagle-Nosed, Shovel-Chinned Dinosaur

[left-of-center2012]

A newfound duck-billed dinosaur (Aquilarhinus Palimentus) species that lived about 80 million years ago had a face so bizarre that scientists named the animal "eagle-nose shovel-chin." Its jaws resembled a pair of gardening tools, with wavy ridges along the edges in a "W" shape. An arching crest in the middle of its face was curved like the majestic beak of an eagle, giving the dinosaur's profile the appearance of a prominent, humped nose.

Scientists found the unusual fossil skull and a partial skeleton of the animal in the 1980s in Big Bend National Park, a site in southwestern Texas, though the specimen was not analyzed in detail until recently.

The duck-billed weirdo shared some features in common with other duck-billed and crested dinosaurs, the group Saurolophidae, but it was more primitive, offering intriguing new clues about how the group's trademark crests evolved, scientists reported in a new study.

That ridged, scooping chin likely came in handy millions of years ago; what is now a dry and rocky landscape in Texas was back then a coastal swamp or marsh. Aquilarhinus probably used its peculiar jaws to scoop vegetation from the bottom of a muddy creek bed, the researchers wrote. However, it's less clear what the dinosaur's prominent nasal crest was for, though it may have been used as a display to help the dinosaurs recognize members of their own kind and compete for mates.



https://www.livescience.com/65937-shovel-chinned-dinosaur.html

[dewsgirl]

1. Aww it's one of those animals that fall into the category of, so ugly it's cute.

Should that be mammal? Honestly I cannot remember.