Table for one-and-a-half.
Scientists have discovered a new “apex predator” dinosaur that appears to have been fossilized right in the middle of eating a crocodile-like creature.
The newly found Joaquinraptor casali was a 23-foot megaraptoran found in Argentina who had his final meal somewhere between 66 and 70 million years ago, in the late Cretaceous period, according to a paper published in Nature Tuesday.
The findings represent “the most completely represented and latest-surviving megaraptorans” ever found, the paper claimed.
A skull, an arm, a leg and tail bones of a 19-year-old specimen were all pulled from the Lago Caolhue Huapi rock formation in Patagonia — with the arm-bone of a prehistoric crocodile preserved in the Joaquinraptor’s jaws, the Associated Press reported.
“Megaraptorids appear to have been the apex predators in central and southern Patagonian paleoecosystems approaching the end of the Cretaceous,” researchers wrote in the paper.
“Furthermore, the unusually close association of a crocodyliform humerus with the type of specimen of this theropod may provide information on the dietary preferences and feeding strategies of Megaraptoridae,” the paper read
Unlike other well-known predatory dinos like the T-Rex and the Velociraptor, this new species, which is classified as a megaraptoran, has massive claws that were believed to be used for greater predation.
The finding “fills a major gap by providing one of the most complete skeletons yet,” Federico Angonlin with the Argentine Museum of Natural Science Bernardino Rivadavia told the AP.
Lead scientists on the study Lucio Ibiricu from the Patagonian Institute of Geology and Paleontology named the apex predator in honor of his departed son Joaquin, who died very young, according to the AP.
“All children love dinosaurs so he would probably be a fan too,” Ibiricu told the outlet.