Scientists unearth fossils of rare Eagle species that lived 25 million years ago

In yet another remarkable discovery, a group of scientists has uncovered the fossil of a yet-unkown species of eagle from 25 million years ago.

The group of researchers from Flinders University in Adelaide found several bone fragments by a dry lake. Scientists believe these remains belong to an ancient hawk called Archaehierax sylvestris.

Like other eagles, this species too survived by preying on possums and koalas, and it was also able to catch low-flying birds. Since this species of hawk was usually found in the forest, the eagle had trained itself and adapted to fly and hunt in the forest area.

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These species had short but strong wings, longer legs and a wide foot-span. These eagles were small in number at that time too so finding remains of these is very rare.

“It’s rare to find even one bone from a fossil eagle. To have most of the skeleton ispretty exciting, especially considering how old it is,” Associate Professor Trevor Worthy said.

These remains were found at the archaeological site in Lake Pinpa, a dried salt lake in the desert in south Australia.

“This species was slightly smaller and leaner than the wedge-tailed eagle, but it’s the largest eagle known from this time period in Australia,” says Flinders University PhD candidate Ellen Mather, first author in thenew paper inHistorical Biology. “Thefoot span was nearly 15 cm long, which would have allowed it to grasp large prey.The largest marsupial predators at the time were about the size of a small dogor large cat, soArchaehierax(pron. ah-kay-high-rax) was certainlyruling the roost.”

The fact that skeleton was almost completely preserved helped the researchers place the species properly in the eagle family tree.

“The completeness of the skeleton allowed us to determine where it fits on the eagle family tree. It shows a range of features unlike any seen among modern hawks and eagles,” Mather explained. “We found that Archaehierax didn’t belong to any of the living genera or families. It seems to have beenits own unique branch of the eagle family,” she says. “It’s unlikely to be a direct ancestor to any species alive today.”