Scientists dub newly discovered dinosaur the Chicken From Hell

Scientists have discovered a freakish, birdlike species of dinosaur which is officially a member of the oviraptorosaurs.

17:38 20 March 2014

Scientists have discovered a new, peculiar birdlike species of dinosaur. Described as 11 feet long, 500 pounds with a beak but no teeth, with bony crest atop its head, prize-fighter arms, murderous claws, a thin tail, spindly legs and feathers all over the place, scientists have nicknamed it the Chicken From Hell.

The dino-bird, which is officially a member of dinosaur group called oviraptorosaurs lived at the end of the Cretaceous period or about 68 million years ago.

Paleontologist Emma Schachner of the University of Utah, one of the scientists, said: “It would look like a really absurd, stretched-out chicken.”

“It would have been a cross between a chicken and a lizard,” added Tyler Lyson, a paleontologist at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History.”
Carnegie Museum paleontologist Matthew Lamanna, the lead author of the new study, said: “It would have had a lot of birdy behaviors.”

“When people think of a dinosaur, they think of something like a T. rex or a brontosaurus, and when they think of a bird, they think of something like a sparrow or a chicken. This animal, Anzu, has a mosaic of features of both of those groups, and so it basically provides a really nice link in the evolutionary chain.”