Best Dinosaur-Era Feather Ever Found Was Hiding in Fossilized Poop

A lab manager named David DeMar picked up a cherry-sized rock in Montana’s Hell Creek Formation back in 2016. What he found inside turned out to be the best-preserved feather ever recovered from the age of dinosaurs, embedded in a chunk of fossilized feces from a large carnivore, possibly a T. rex. The droppings also contained more feathers, bone fragments, and two tiny fish scales, evidence of a whole food chain preserved in one small stone.

The feather belonged to an ancient diving bird similar to a loon or grebe, one of many bird types that vanished with the dinosaurs. Researchers suggest the birds that survived the asteroid impact winter had better insulation, though not all scientists agree with that conclusion. The study was published in the journal Current Biology.

Beyond the headline-grabbing story, this find opens up a new way to study soft tissues preserved in dinosaur coprolites. There may be more than feathers waiting in those rocks. What would you want scientists to find next?