#kakuru

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Unsolved Paleo Mysteries Month #04 -- Who’s That Theropod?

In the early 1970s an opalized dinosaur leg bone in a South Australian gem shop came to the attention of paleontologist Neville Pledge. The specimen’s owner allowed it to be borrowed and studied, and it was eventually named as Kakuru kujani -- Kakuru after the Rainbow Serpent of Australian Aboriginal mythology, and kujani after a variant spelling of the Guyani, the local indigenous people. Later the fossil was auctioned off to another private owner and lost to science for nearly 30 years, until finally being acquired by the South Australian Museum in 2004.

But all we really know about Kakuru is that it was some sort of theropod dinosaur. The 33cm (1′) tibia probably belonged to an animal up to about 2m long (6′6″), living during the Early Cretaceous (~125-112 mya), but any placement in a specific group is almost impossible. Based on particular features of the bone -- such as a tall and narrow astragalar process -- it’s been proposed to be either an oviraptorosaur or an abelisaur. But more recent examinations have concluded the bone’s preservation is too poor for those features to be confidently identified, and consider Kakuru to be a basal coelurosaur or even just a dubious name for an indeterminate theropod.

It’s all a bit of a mess, really, and more and better material is needed to clear up this mysterious dinosaur’s identity.

I’ve restored Kakuru here in three different ways, to illustrate just how varied the interpretations are -- on the left, an early oviraptorosaur; in the middle, a generic coelurosaur; and on the right, an abelisaur.

This Week in Dinosaur News: A new dinosaur was named after Thanos and 39 juvenile Psittacosaurus went on display in China

A cast of a huge group of Psittacosaurus. The original just went on display. From commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Psittacosaurus_nest.jpg

Here’s what came out this week in dinosaur news:

A new dinosaur, and close relative to Carnotaurus, was named after the supervillain Thanos source

The holotype jaw of Megalosaurus from the 1790s was chemically analyzed, they found Lead and Barium indicating two…

Source: http://paleoartists.deviantart.com/art/Kakuru-kujani-4442958

Name: Kakuru kujani

Name Meaning: Kujani Rainbow Serpent

First Described: 1980

Described By: Molnar & Pledge

Classification: Dinosauria, Saurischia, Eusaurischia, Theropoda, Neotheropoda, Averostra, Tetanurae, Orionides, Avetheropoda, Coelurosauria, Tyrannoraptora, Maniraptoriformes, Maniraptora

Kakuru is only known from a single fossilized bone, but this was espeically interesting as the bone had gone through a rare process in which it was transformed into opal. The bone was found in Andamooka, South Australia, and it ldates to the Aptian age of the Early Cretaceous, about 113 to 125 million years ago. Its classification is actually highly debatable, given the lack of remains; though it was definitely a theropod, it could have been anything from an oviraptor to an abelisauroid. Though it was very slender and gracile, carnivorous, and about 2 to 3 meters long, with very long and thin legs. 

Sources: 

http://www.prehistoric-wildlife.com/species/k/kakuru.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kakuru