Microraptor, << my kroh RAP tuhr, >> was a small, feathered dinosaur that lived about 130 million to 120 million years ago. It looked like a bird in many ways, with long feathers on arms that resembled wings. However, Microraptor had the same type of feathers on its legs, giving it the appearance of having four wings.
Microraptor ranks among the smallest dinosaurs known, growing only to the size of a crow. The feathers on its limbs looked much like the flight feathers of modern birds. Short, downlike feathers covered the rest of the body. Microraptor also had a pair of showy feathers on its long, thin tail. Scientists have used electron microscopes to study fossils of Microraptor’s feathers. This research has shown that the feathers were black and iridescent (displaying shifting colors), much like the feathers of a modern blackbird.
Microraptor lived in forests, where it probably fed on a variety of birds, insects, and mammals. It may have used its feathered limbs to glide between trees. Most scientists do not think Microraptor could fly in the same manner as a modern bird, in part because it could not flap its limbs like wings. It also lacked certain skeletal features associated with flight.
Microraptor was a dromaeosaur << droh MEE uh sawr >>, a group that includes Velociraptor and other well-known dinosaurs. Dromaeosaurs shared many features, including an enlarged second toe with a large claw.
Fossils of Microraptor were discovered in the late 1990’s in Liaoning Province, in northeastern China. Scientists have found a variety of other feathered dinosaurs in this area. These fossils and other evidence suggest that feathers first appeared among a group of dinosaurs called theropods. Most scientists think that birds arose from among these dinosaurs. Although birds appeared tens of millions of years before Microraptor, they may have descended from tree-dwelling dinosaurs that were similar to Microraptor.
