Dino card No. 0213 of 2,027

Avimaia

Say it: av-ih-MY-uh

Name means: “bird mother”1

Ate: MeatEarly birdsEarly Cretaceous

Avimaia was a small bird that lived about 120 million years ago. It is special because scientists found an egg still inside its body. This helps us learn how ancient birds had babies.2 1

Lived

121 to 113 million years ago2

Early Cretaceous

Fossils found in

Changma, Yumen, Gansu Province, northwestern China2 1

Food

Meat2

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

cool stuff

Fun facts

Avimaia is the only fossil bird ever found with an unlaid egg still inside its body.1

The eggshell of Avimaia was very thin and had multiple layers. Scientists think this happened because the egg stayed too long inside the mother.1

Avimaia's leg bones contain medullary bone. This is a special tissue that only female birds make when they are ready to lay eggs.1

The egg of Avimaia was flattened and measured about 5.2 square centimeters.1

Avimaia lived during the Early Cretaceous period, about 121 to 113 million years ago.2

The name Avimaia means 'bird mother' in Latin, because the fossil is a female with an egg.1

AI-made picture of Avimaia — An AI-made picture of how Avimaia might have looked, made by a computer from what scientists know. It is a guess: the real animal may have looked different, and nobody knows its true colours.

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For dino experts

Scientific name: Avimaia
Named by: Bailleul et al. 20192
Group: Early birds
Family / clade: Enantiornithes2
Classification: Theropoda > Avialae2
Age of the rocks: 121 to 113 million years (Aptian)2
Rock formations: Xiagou2
Countries: China2
Fossil records: 1 in the Paleobiology Database2
Discovery: Avimaia was named in 2019 by Alida Bailleul and her team. The fossil was found in the Xiagou Formation in China.2 1
Still debated: Scientists are not sure why the eggshell of Avimaia was so thin and had multiple layers. It might have been a health problem or a normal part of its reproduction.1

Where the facts come from

nature.com (nature.com)
Avimaia in The Paleobiology Database (CC BY 4.0): age, places, rock formations, classification.

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