The evidence is strong. Paleontologists found a fossil of the small, bird-like dinosaur with remains of a bird in its gut. It appears that the dinosaur grabbed the bird and swallowed it whole. The bird must have been the dinosaur's last meal, given how fossils for the two animals were preserved together over millions of years.
Before I continue here, for the sake of brevity, the word "dinosaur" by itself in this text will refer to a non-avian dinosaur. Birds are living dinosaurs, confusing the whole matter. Paleontologists continue to grapple over the differences and similarities between the two animal groups. For example, there's ongoing debate on whether or not the world's supposed oldest known bird was actually a dinosaur.
This latest discovery sheds important light on how some dinosaurs and birds interacted.
The project leader was Jingmai O'Connor of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology in China. O'Connor and colleagues Zhonghe Zhou and Xing Xu write in the paper, "Preserved indicators of diet are extremely rare in the fossil record; even more so is unequivocal direct evidence for predator–prey relationships. Here, we report on a unique specimen of the small nonavian theropod Microraptor gui from the Early Cretaceous Jehol biota, China, which has the remains of an adult enantiornithine bird preserved in its abdomen, most likely not scavenged, but captured and consumed by the dinosaur."
I love that enantiornithines have their own Facebook page. As you can see there, they were extinct birds that still retained teeth and had clawed fingers on their wings. These birds evolved for tree living, given how their legs and feet were shaped. The Microraptor therefore likely lived in trees too.
Read more at Discovery News
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