Outline: a typical theropod
Caihong
"rainbow"
Type species Caihong juji
- Lived
- 162 to 155 million years ago, Late Jurassic
- Diet
- Carnivore
- Group
- Theropods
- Found in
- China
- Named by
- Hu et al. 2018
Where its fossils were found
The evidence
Today
160 million years ago
Field notes
About Caihong
What it was like
Caihong was a small feathered dinosaur about the size of a duck. Tiny pigment structures in its fossil feathers suggest its head and neck feathers shone with changing, rainbow-like colors, as in a hummingbird. It had bony crests over its eyes and long feathers along its arms and tail.
Its world
It lived about 162 to 155 million years ago, in the Late Jurassic, in what is now China. Its bones come from the Tiaojishan Formation, a land of forests and lakes shared with other small feathered dinosaurs such as Anchiornis and the bat-winged Yi.
How it was found
Hu and colleagues named it in 2018 from one find. The type species is Caihong juji.
Lived alongside
Found in the same rock formations
Close relatives
Other members of Paraves
Sources: WikidataNamed in: D.-Y. Hu, J. A. Clarke, and C. M. Eliason, R. Qiu, Q.-G. Li, M. D. Shawkey, C.-L. Zhao, L. D.'Alba, J. K. Jiang, X. Xu . 2018. A bony-crested Jurassic dinosaur with evidence of iridescent plumage highlights complexity in early paravian evolution. Nature Communications 9(217)