World’s first one Fingered Dinosaur Found in Mongolia

Looking more like a science experiment gone wrong, it’s difficult to tell exactly what those two appendages sticking out from the chest area of this little dinosaur are.

According to National Geographic, this parrot-sized dinosaur recently unearthed in north-eastern China, has been discovered with just one enlarged “digging” finger on each hand.

Not including modern birds, which are dinosaurs that have modified the lone claws on each of their hands into part of their wings, this tiny one-fingered bug-eating dinosaur is a first for palaeontologists. The beast marks the only dinosaur known to date to sport just a single digit on each hand.

The new dinosaur was discovered in a fossil-rich rock formation that dates to the late Cretaceous period, between 84 and 75 million years ago. The site is near the Inner Mongolian town of Linhe, which helped inspire the dinosaur’s name…Linhenykus.

Unfortunately the artist’s rendition is utter garbage – if the one-clawed hands were used for digging, they’d at least need arms! The painting makes it look like it’s just really really cold outside (if you know what I mean).

What’s he gonna do, rub its chest on the ground to dig for bugs?