Khaung Ra's Oculudentavis

The genus name Oculudentavis was chosen to include the combination of the words oculus, dentes, and avis. These Latin words translate to "eye", "teeth", and "bird" respectively. The specific name honors Khaung Ra, the woman who donated the piece of amber to the Hupoge Amber Museum for study. Presently, the holotype is cataloged as HPG-15-3 in the Hupoge Amber Museum.

While Oculudentavis looked superficially like a bird due to its fused skull bones and tapered snout, its squamate identity was proven by several anatomical features. Its teeth were fused to the inner sides of the jawbones, a classic trait of many lizards. The skull featured a distinctively shaped quadrate bone (a key jaw-joint bone) unique to squamates. It lacked the specific skull opening in front of the eye that is found in dinosaurs and birds.

This initially led scientists to believe it was a hummingbird-sized avian dinosaur—making headlines globally as the "world's smallest dinosaur". However, subsequent discoveries and analysis revealed its true lizard identity. Paleontologists believe the lizard's extreme miniaturization was the product of island dwarfism, as the region of modern Myanmar was an isolated island arc system during the Cretaceous period.

Squamates are defined by their scaled skin and highly flexible, "kinetically mobile" skulls, which allow them to open their mouths incredibly wide. While Oculudentavis looked superficially like a bird due to its fused skull bones and tapered snout, its squamate identity was proven by several anatomical features:

• Pleurodont Teeth: Its teeth were fused to the inner sides of the jawbones, a classic trait of many lizards.

• The Quadrate Bone: The skull featured a distinctively shaped quadrate bone (a key jaw-joint bone) unique to squamates.

• No Antorbital Fenestra: It lacked the specific skull opening in front of the eye that is found in dinosaurs and birds.

TBA

Reproduction

• Mating may occur only every 1–6 years.

• Females lay eggs about 9–12 months after mating.

• Eggs take 14–19 months to hatch (very long incubation).

• Sex of hatchlings depends on temperature (warmer = males).

• Sexual maturity: 1–2 years.

TBA

TBA

• Movement Pattern: Not a Migrant

• Individual Type: Solo

• Population Trend: Stable

• Population: 0

• Locomotion: Arboreal

• Habitat: Montane Grasslands and Shrublands; Temperate Coniferous Forests; Temperate Broadleaf and Mixed Forests; Temperate Deciduous Forests; Temperate Grasslands, Savannas, and Shrublands; Subtropical Coniferous Forests; Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests; Subtropical Dry Broadleaf Forests; Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas, and Shrublands; Stone Forest; Tropical Coniferous Forests; Tropical Moist Broadleaf Forests; Tropical Dry Broadleaf Forests; Tropical Grasslands; Tropical Savannas and Shrublands; Mediterranean Forests, Woodlands, and Scrub; Flooded Grasslands and Savannas; Swamp; Bayous/Billabongs; Riparian; Wetland; Mangrove Forest; Cold Bamboo Forests; Tropical Bamboo Forests.

• Earth: 

  • Extinct: Myanmar

Coming soon

These include poor working conditions for miners (many of whom are underage), and allegations that the high-end trade of Burmese amber helps to fund the Kachin conflict, akin to blood diamonds, losing any love ones and lead human's demise like Burmese ethnic groups. As of April 2020, the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology has discouraged its members from collecting and studying Burmese amber due to the connections between the resource and human rights abuse.

• They are the last survivors of an order of reptiles that thrived in the age of the dinosaurs.

• TBA

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oculudentavis

• https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2068-4

• https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960982221007387

• https://www.science.org/content/article/head-tiny-dinosaur-found-trapped-amber

• https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/worlds-smallest-dinosaur-revealed-be-mystery-reptile-180977975/

• https://www.deviantart.com/ognimdo2002/art/Oculudentavis-khaungraae-897518966