In Depth
Yuanchuavis is a genus of enantiornithine bird that lived in Asia during the early Cretaceous. Yuanchuavis is confirmed to have had two elongated retrices (flight feathers) in the tail. Melanosome sampling of the holotype fossil suggests that the elongated retrices would have been black in life, while the remaining tail feathers either iridescent or dark grey
Further reading
- An Early Cretaceous enantiornithine bird with a pintail. - Current Biology. - Min Wang, Jingmai K.O’Connor, Tao Zhao, Yanhong Pan, Xiaoting Zheng, Xiaoli Wang & Zhonghe Zhou - 2021.
