At the end of the Triassic period, in what is now the state of Wyoming in the United States, there existed a strange beast with a parrot-like beak and a dinosaur body. It was named Beesiiwo cooowuse, a new species. The Beast Just Appeared in America The beast has just appeared in the US – (Photo: Gabriel Ugueto).
In an interview with Live Science, paleontologist David Lovelace from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (USA) said that Beesiiwo cooowuse was not particularly large, weighing only 5-7kg and about 0.6m long.
It is an herbivore, often consuming conifers, ferns, etc., with a mouth that looks like a parrot’s beak and effectively cuts leaves. It belongs to a larger group of ancient reptiles called rhynchosaurs.
Up to five fossil specimens of rhynchosaur have been unearthed in the Popo Agie Formation, a Triassic geological formation in the Bighorn Mountains, part of the Northern Rocky Mountains.
Three of the five specimens belonged to the new species Beesiiwo cooowuse. Because the place where it appeared belongs to Native American lands, scientists worked with the Northern Arapaho Tribal Historical Preservation Office to name it after the aforementioned Arapaho language, which means “lizard.” large lizards from the Alcova area”.
Research just published in the scientific journal Diversity says it belongs to the group of the most ancient lizards. The strange “hybrid” shape of this beast is not too difficult to understand, because it is a distant relative of both today’s crocodiles and birds.
Because the specimen includes part of the monster’s jaws, it also helps scientists reconstruct the landscape and environment of the area during the ancient Triassic period.
