47 million year old bird fossil offers evidence of oldest known pollinator
Wednesday, May 28, 2014 - 09:02
in Paleontology & Archaeology
(Phys.org) —A pair of researchers with Germany's Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum in Frankfurt has found fossil evidence of a bird that lived approximately 47 million years ago which pollinated plants. The bird (Pumiliornis tessellatus), approximately the size of a modern hummingbird was found in Messel Pit, a well known dig site near Frankfurt. Gerald Mayr and Volker Wilde have documented their discovery in a paper published in the journal Biology Letters.