2023-07-04 17:20:21
Two members of the Manuel de Torres Paleontological Museum of the Buenos Aires town of San Pedro found the fossil remains of a thousand-year-old woodpecker which, they claimed, is the The most complete fossilized specimen of that bird ever found to date in all of South America.
The historic find took place while Jose Luis Aguilar and Silvina Carra made one of their usual tours of a rough extraction quarry which is located about 5 kilometers east of San Pedroand, suddenly, they observed some tiny pieces on a rocky ledge brown color that powerfully called their attention.
it was so they cut a small lump of sediment that contained the fossilized bones and they took it to the museum laboratory where, after carrying out the first cleaning tasks, they managed to detect that inside that rock there was a very complete fossilized birdsince he had the entire skull and jaws, humerus, carpometacarpus, femur, tibiotarsus with fibula fragment, pelvic girdle, synsacrum, scapula, ulna, radius, and three cervical vertebrae.
After carefully analyzing each of the parties that were in perfect state of preservation, the experts were able to determine that they belonged to a woodpecker that inhabited the area more than 2,000,000 years ago.
“The state of conservation of the specimen is amazing. Its delicate parts have been preserved in a fine silt that was later transformed into rock. We believe that its age is over 200,000 yearssince it was found in sediments deposited at the base of a geological age called Buenos Aires”, he explained José Luis Aguilar, director of the museum and co-author of the discovery.
“The fossil bones of the specimen were articulated in a life positiondistributed in a small space of only 16 centimeters long by 4 centimeters wide; backwards skull and jawshis left arm contracted and his elongated hind leg. In the ulna we can see the cannulas or remigial papillae where the feathers t-shirts”, added the co-author of this unprecedented discovery.
Now, the most complete fossil woodpecker specimen in South America that is being studied by a team of specialists led by Dr. Jorge Noriega -one of the most renowned fossil bird researchers in Argentina-, It will be exhibited at the San Pedro Paleontological Museum.
“We are very happy with this finding since provides a unique specimen for the study of this group of birds. Its skull and its extremities will reveal data that fill in the existing gaps in the fossil record of these birds”, concluded Aguilar.
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