Ancient dinosaur species discovered in Zimbabwe

JOHANNESBURG — A newly identified dinosaur species from Zimbabwe is providing new insights into how dinosaurs diversified, with scientists saying Wednesday that the find suggests the animals adapted to and spread across different ecosystems in southern Africa.

The species, named Musango matusadonaensis, was identified from a skeleton unearthed in 2018 along the shores of Lake Kariba in northern Zimbabwe. Researchers said it is only the fifth dinosaur species to be discovered in the country.

It lived about 210 million years ago during the Late Triassic, when dinosaurs were beginning to spread across the planet but had yet to become the dominant land animals, said the international team of palaeontologists behind the discovery.

Unlike the giant long-necked dinosaurs that evolved millions of years later, Musango was relatively lightly built, about 4.5 meters (15 feet) long and weighing an estimated 222 kilograms (490 pounds) — about the weight of a fully grown pig.

It was named after the local Shona word “musango”, meaning “living in the bush”.

“Until recently, it was assumed that the dinosaurs living across southern Africa were largely the same,” said Paul Barrett, researcher at the Natural History Museum in London.

The discovery suggests the region was instead made up of several distinct ecosystems, each home to different dinosaur species, Barrett said in a statement.

“It suggests that what we’ve found so far is only the tip of the iceberg,” he said.

His team’s findings were published in the Journal of Systematic Palaeontology.

The fossil is among the most complete dinosaur skeletons of its age found in Zimbabwe, with bones from its spine, ribs, arms, legs and feet preserved.

Researchers estimated Musango was about eight years old and nearly fully grown when it died. The bones also showed it had recovered from a serious injury or infection.

While its skull has not been found, researchers believe Musango was probably a herbivore or an omnivore, feeding on plants growing along rivers and streams.

In 2022, scientists in Zimbabwe discovered the remains of Africa’s oldest dinosaur, which roamed the earth around 230 million years ago.

The dinosaur, named Mbiresaurus raathi, was only about one meter tall, with a long tail, and weighed up to 30 kilograms.

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