Newly discovered prehistoric bird lived near a balmy North Pole

[TexasTowelie]

The North Pole wasn't always a winter wonderland. Rewind 90 million years, and scientists think it was probably as warm as parts of Florida.

A new clue supporting that idea is a fossilized wing bone belonging to a newly discovered prehistoric bird found in the Canadian Arctic. The duck-size creature looked like a cross between a sea gull and a cormorant, but with a beak full of teeth. It could both fly and dive, and it most likely lived alongside turtles, crocodilelike reptiles and a whole lot of fish.

"This was a hyperwarm period, a real spike in temperatures where we think even during the winter there wasn't freezing water," said John Tarduno, a geophysicist from the University of Rochester. "Tingmiatornis arctica adds to this picture that we have of this incredibly warm Arctic 90 million years ago."

Tarduno and his team published their findings Monday in the journal Scientific Reports.

Read more: https://www.adn.com/arctic/2016/12/23/newly-discovered-prehistoric-bird-lived-near-a-balmy-north-pole/