Asiahesperornis

Asiahesperornis
Temporal range: Late Cretaceous, 70 Ma
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Order: Saurischia
Suborder: Theropoda
Clade: Hesperornithes
Family: Hesperornithidae
Genus: Asiahesperornis
Nesov & Prizemlin, 1991
Species: A. bazhanovi
Nesov & Prizemlin, 1991

Asiahesperornis is a prehistoric foot-propelled[1] diving[2] toothed flightless bird genus from the Late Cretaceous. The single known species is Asiahesperornis bazhanovi. It lived in what today is Kazakhstan, at its time the shores of the shallow Turgai Sea.

It was a member of the Hesperornithes, flightless toothed seabirds of the Cretaceous. Its exact relationships are not completely resolved, but it probably belongs into the Hesperornithidae just like Hesperornis, well-known from the Western Interior Seaway that covered most of the US Midwest in the Mesozoic.[3] Its name is derived from its findings in Asia.

References

  1. Dyke, Gareth J., Malakhov, D.V. and Chiappe, L.M. (2006) The marine bird Asiahesperornis from the Cretaceous of northern Kazakhstan. Cretaceous Research, 27, (6), 947-953.
  2. "A re-analysis of the marine bird Asiahesperornis". ScienceDirect. Retrieved 8 December 2013.
  3. Mortimer, Micheal. "Phylogeny of taxa". The Therapod Database. Retrieved 2013-03-02.


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