It’s rare enough to find a plant encased in amber, rarer still to find part of a dinosaur – so imagine paleontologists’ surprise when they discovered this feathery "flower" was in fact a feathery tail that once belonged to a juvenile theropod. The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.

The fascinating case of mistaken identity began back in 2015 when Lida Xing stumbled upon a hunk of amber at a market in Myanmar. Believed to contain plant material, the 99-million-year-old fossil was already polished ready to be sold as a trinket – until Xing noticed something was amiss, and suggested that the Dexu Institute of Palaeontology buy it.

Upon closer inspection, it became apparent that entombed in the amber was no plant, but the feather

See Full Page