Halszkaraptor

dinosaur · water hunter · Mongolia · unusual

Weird dinosaur mix. Halszkaraptor looked like someone mixed a dinosaur with a duck or cormorant (a diving water bird). It had features of many different animals rolled into one creature.

Fast river hunter. This dinosaur was about the size of a large dog and likely hunted fish and small prey in streams and rivers across Mongolia during the Late Cretaceous period, around 75 million years ago.

Strange fossil find. Scientists discovered only one Halszkaraptor skeleton, making it one of the more mysterious dinosaurs. Its unusual mix of features confused experts about exactly what kind of dinosaur it was.

Built for water. Halszkaraptor had flexible arms and feet that worked like paddles, similar to water birds today. This special design made it excellent at swimming and diving to catch food.

Dromaeosaur relative. Despite looking so different, Halszkaraptor belonged to the raptor family of dinosaurs, though it lived a completely different lifestyle than hunting dinosaurs on land.