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The skull of this bird, called Falcatakely forsterae, was preserved in the rock between 66 and 72 million years ago.
A bizarre Mesozoic-era bird had a small sickle-like beak with a tooth at the tip. Its fossil was found in Madagascar and suggests a lost world of ancient birds that paleontologists are just beginning to discover.
Similar to the little toucan
Measuring less than 9 centimeters and sporting a deep, curved beak, the bird would have looked a bit like a tiny toucan. The skull of this bird, called Falcatakely forsterae, was preserved in the rock between 66 and 72 million years ago.
The fossil was discovered in a block of stone extracted from a rich fossil site in Madagascar. In addition to some large dinosaur bones, the quarry where Falcatakely was found also returned some small bird bones.
Most prehistoric birds, like their modern counterparts, were small and had delicate, hollow bones. The harshness of the fossilization process has destroyed more ancient birds than preserved. However, when conditions were right, exceptional specimens such as Falcatakely were locked in stone.
Extinct group
The fossil is very thin in places, but the beak, upper jaw parts and eye socket have been preserved well enough to provide a detailed look at the bird’s profile. The bones mark Falcatakely as belonging to an extinct group of birds called enantiornithines that thrived during the Cretaceous period.
When the bird was alive, Falcatakely shared its relatively dry habitat with herbivorous pig-like crocodiles, stubby-armed carnivorous dinosaurs, and mammals the size of a badger. Falcatakely fits into that extravagant menagerie, whose strangeness was likely spurred on by Madagascar’s isolation after the island split from India 88 million years ago
Falcatakely forsterae
Member of an extinct group called Enantiornithines – the first group to resemble modern birds
Skull and upper jaw similar to non-flying dinosaurs like T. Rex
Overall face shape similar to that of modern birds
A complex series of grooves in the bones on the side of the face indicates an expansive keratinous beak
About the size of a modern crow
Discovery: Mahajanga region, Madagascar
Artist’s impression based on the finding of a skull. Credit: Mark Witton
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