Undiscovered dinosaurs: We are entering the golden era of fossil finds

THE name “tyrannosaur” conjures up images of towering predators with enormous heads and ridiculously small arms. But Moros intrepidus wasn’t like that. This 96-million-year-old tyrannosaur was the size of a deer, a lanky pipsqueak of a predator.

It is far from the only dinosaur to strut onto the stage this year – 31 new species have been named so far. There’s Bajadasaurus pronuspinax, discovered in Patagonia, which hit the headlines for the forward-facing spines jutting from its neck, and little Ambopteryx longibrachium, unearthed in China, which confirmed that some feathery dinosaurs flapped around using bat-like wings.

These add to a tally…