The “lake hunter”, a large carnivorous dinosaur found in La Rioja and unique in the world

It has been named

Riojavenatrix lacustris

and is a new dinosaur species, unique in the world of paleontology.

The fossil, found in Igea (La Rioja), corresponds to a specimen of the spinosaurid family between 7 and 8 meters in length, 2.5 meters in height and around 1,500 kilograms in weight, which walked on its hind limbs. in the Lower Cretaceous, approximately 120 million years ago.

His portrait is completed with other characteristics typical of theropods (a group that includes large carnivorous dinosaurs): a head with a low and elongated skull, prominent jaws with sharp teeth and arms with powerful claws with three functional fingers, with which he could easily remove the heads of his prey.

Their main diet was fish.

“It is possible that it fished on the shores of the lake, hence its name,

Riojaventrix lacustris

, which refers to the hunter of the lake of La Rioja, although it is not ruled out that it could feed on terrestrial prey,” explains Francisco Sáez Benito, honorary director of the Paleontological Interpretation Center of La Rioja.

More information

Footprints of swimming dinosaurs discovered in La Rioja

This research, whose first fossil remains were found in 1983 in one of the existing sites in Igea (a Rioja town of barely 650 inhabitants), has been published in the British magazine

Zoological Journal of the Linneal Society

and confirms “the existence of a new genus and species of spinosaurid”, as testified by those responsible for the work.

“It is the first dinosaur described in La Rioja,” add the authors of the study, and the fifth spinosaurid recorded in this period of prehistory in the Iberian Peninsula.

It thus joins a list that already includes the

Camarillasaurus

, in Aragon;

the

Vallibonavenatrix

and the

Protathlitis

, in the Valencian Community, and the

Iberospinus

, in Portugal.

Illustration of reconstruction of the dinosaur discovered in La RiojaArdián Blázquez

This finding is included in the doctoral thesis by the researcher at the University of the Basque Country, Erik Isasmendi.

“The new genus and species, which we colloquially call

Britney

, is the result of the discovery of a partial skeleton, which consists of hind limbs (femur, tibia, fibula, ankle bones and phalanges of the foot) and the pelvis (pubis and ischium). ), as well as a vertebral remains," Isasmendi clarifies about the findings of the Garras research team, which works at the ichnites (fossil remains) site in the small Riojan town of Igea.

The paleontologist also highlights that the new dinosaur "presents a combination of anatomical characters that make it unique and allows it to be differentiated from other spinosaurids, including Baryonyx

,

" in reference to the iconic skeleton of that dinosaur that is exhibited at the Natural History Museum in London. .

The

Riojavenatrix

is ​​not the only great discovery at that paleontological site.

Other fossil remains had also been found there, such as one of the “most complete skeletons known in Europe and the world” of a spinosaurid dinosaur, which was named

Villar

.

“The fossils discovered are of great paleontological interest and allow us to put La Rioja on the world map of spinosaurids and carnivorous dinosaurs,” says Xabier Pereda, one of the directors of the doctoral thesis and director of excavation at Igea.

“These discoveries raise many new questions about the ecology of these animals, that is, about how these species coexisted with each other.

And that leads us to rethink future more detailed studies on spinosaurids from which, surely, important results will be obtained,” reflects Elena Cuesta, co-author of the study and researcher at the Egidio Feruglio Paleontological Museum (Argentina) and at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany).

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