North America's Tiniest Dino Found

Chicken-sized predator roamed Canada 75M years ago

By Rob Quinn, Newser Staff

Posted Mar 17, 2009 4:16 AM CDT

(Newser) – Scientists have identified the remains of the smallest dinosaur species ever found in North America, reports National Geographic. Hesperonychus elizabethae was a Cretaceous-era carnivore no bigger than a chicken, according to researchers. Scientists believe the existence of the Velociraptor cousin helps confirm that dinosaurs, not mammals, filled the role of small predators in long-ago North America.

Researchers first thought the tiny bones belonged to a juvenile, but realized it was an adult after observing the hip bones were fused. The birdlike, tree-hugging dinosaur's curved hip bones also may shed light on the origin of flight. Dinosaur bones this small are exceedingly rare, scientists say, but this new find may point to the existence of even smaller dinosaurs.

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This photo shows the blade-like slashing claw from the second toe of the foot, on a Canadian quarter for scale, of tiny Hesperonychus elizabethae. (AP Photo/Nicholas Longrich, University of Calgary)

This black-and-white artist rendering shows Hesperonychus elizabethae chasing a cicada through a forest in Alberta, Canada, 75 million years ago. (AP Photo/Nicholas Longrich, University of Calgary)

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University of Calgary paleontologist Nick Longrich explains the discovery of Hesperonychus elizabethae, a pint-sized cousin of Velociraptor. (gradysemmens)

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This tells us that North American dinosaurs likely out-competed mammals for both large and small predator niches. - Dr Philip Currie, a palaeontologist from the University of Calgary

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North America's Tiniest Dino Found