Researchers found the partial skeleton in what’s known as the Hell Creek Formation, rocks rich in fossil specimens, and date it to about 66 million years ago. Fittingly for this massive frankenpredator, the bones were found in a place called the Hell Creek Formation, among South Dakota’s otherworldly badlands.
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The newly discovered fossil was described in a study published by the University of Kansas Paleological Institute last week. Though not particularly large enough to threaten a few of the largest predators of its time, Dakotaraptor would have been imposing compared to the smaller Velociraptor. The creatures were 17 feet long from nose to tail and their wings – which were largely decorative – extended three feet from their bodies.
The researchers say that it is unlikely that the raptor could fly with its size, but perhaps it used the feathers to keep its eggs warm. Quill knobs are a stand out clue to the existence of feather quills on the forearm of the Cretaceous Dakotaraptor.
“Rather, it is more plausible that Dakotaraptor descended from an evolutionary line that already possessed flight or that was already sufficiently close to attaining it that it had evolved a suite of advanced adaptations for its facilitation”, suggesting that Dakotaraptor could help fill in the blanks when it comes to scientists’ understanding of the evolution of flight and flightnessness. However, due to its size, the Dakotaraptor couldn’t have used them for flight.
Flightlessness aside, the Dakotaraptor would have been a fearsome predator. Fossils of the new species indicate the animals had long powerful legs that made them fast runners, providing them with a predatory and escape advantage.
According to the study’s authors, the Dakotaraptor filled a key niche in the sub-tropical swampy world that was late Cretaceous South Dakota.
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According to the team, Dakotaraptor steini would have been occasionally in direct competition with smaller tyrannosaurid dinosaurs such as young Tyrannosaurus rex or Nanotyrannus lancensis, which, at an adult length of 20 – 30 feet (6 – 9 m), were not much larger than the new species.
