Wunyelfia

Wunyelfia is known from a nearly adult skeleton, including neck bones, back bones, and parts of the shoulders and hips.3

Its neck bones have special features that show it belongs to a group called aristonectines, known for very long necks.3

Wunyelfia lived in the Weddellian Province, a cold ocean region near Antarctica during the Late Cretaceous.3

The name Wunyelfia comes from the Mapuche word for Venus, the planet, and also a symbol of freedom.1

Wunyelfia is the second aristonectine plesiosaur found in the southeastern Pacific from the late Maastrichtian.3

Its fossils are about 72 to 66 million years old, from the very end of the Age of Dinosaurs.2