Bizarre’ bird-like dinosaur has scientists enthralled

About 148 to 150 million years ago, a strange pheasant-sized and bird-like dinosaur with elongated legs and arms built much like wings inhabited southeastern China, with a puzzling anatomy suggesting it either was a fast runner or lived a lifestyle like a modern wading bird. A remarkable event in dinosaur evolution came when small feathered two-legged dinosaurs from a lineage known as theropods gave rise to birds late in the Jurassic, with the oldest-known bird - Archaeopteryx - dating to roughly 150 million years ago in Germany. Fujianvenator is a member of a grouping called avialans that includes all birds and their closest non-avian dinosaur relatives, Mr. Wang said. After Archaeopteryx - a crow-sized bird with teeth, a long bony tail, and no beak - there is a canyon of about 20 million years before the next birds appear in the fossil record.