Fierce Dinos Roamed Prehistoric Asia

Sept. 11, 2007 — Dinosaurs recently unearthed in China — including an "ungainly," 19-foot armored beast and a "fierce" carnivore found with the clawed foot and leg of a raptor in its gut — are painting a grisly picture of prehistory.

Since the two species, Zhejiangosaurus lishuiensis and Sinocalliopteryx gigas, represent different dinosaur groups, one of which was not even thought to be in China, the finds also add to a growing body of evidence that Asia was teeming with life over 100 million years ago.

Lu Junchang, who led the Zhejiangosaurus research, described the discovery as the "most important" of its kind in China.

Lu, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences in Beijing, explained that the fossil proves nodosaurids — spiked, bony-plated herbivorous dinosaurs with powerful jaws — once lived in China. Similar specimens have been found in Wyoming and Kansas.

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"This particular dinosaur had bony dermal plates covering the top part of its body, two lines of sharp spikes that protruded from its back, and a clubless tail," coauthor Jin Xingsheng, deputy curator of the Zhejiang Provincial Museum of Natural Sciences, said.

The species also had "a mild temperament and (an) ungainly build," the researchers wrote.

Found in East China's Zhejiang Province, the dinosaur might have been dinner for Sinocalliopteryx, a carnivorous predator with a taste for other dinosaurs. An incomplete, yet large, leg of a raptor dinosaur, including its sickle-clawed toes, was found in the carnivore's abdominal cavity.

Ji Shu'an, another Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences researcher, led the research.

Both discoveries were published in the journal Acta Geologica Sinica.

Sinocalliopteryx means "Chinese beautiful feather," in reference to the fact that this northeastern China specimen retained remnants of feathery structures that covered its skin. The skeleton indicates that the dino's thigh, hip and the base of its tail were especially feathery.

Feather structures even covered the upper part of the creature's feet, suggesting that bird foot feathers first emerged in dinosaurs, and not in birds themselves.

Scientists, however, sometimes debate whether feathered dinosaurs were actually very primitive birds. In fact, the raptor leg in the carnivore's gut belonged to a very bird-like, "beast-footed" meat eater, although the exact species remains unknown.

The sickle-shaped claw of the partially digested second toe, and other claws, exist in their natural, articulated position, perhaps suggesting that Sinocalliopteryx bit the leg and foot off a live raptor.

The dino's gut also contained four nearly inch-long stones, which Ji Shu'an and his team believe were gastroliths, or deliberately swallowed stones retained in the gut to help slice and pulverize food.

Since many birds, such as chickens and ostriches, swallow small rocks for similar purposes, the Sinocalliopteryx stones further strengthen the dinosaur-bird link.

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