What has feathers, T-rex-like feet, and a hooked beak that could sever the spinal cord of a horse with one blow? It might sound like a beast from a fantasy novel or horror film, but in fact it’s a creature that actually existed - the scariest bird you can imagine, scaled up to nightmarish proportions. Say hello to the terror bird.
After a meteor wiped out Velociraptorand Tyrannosaurus rex, the terror bird family rose to occupy the niche of terrifying top predator in South America – a supremacy that lasted for almost 60 million years. During that time, 17 species in this family of lethal-beaked meatheads came and went, all the while gorging on a smorgasbord of plant-eating mammals until these scary birds disappeared about 2.5 million years ago.
With few fossils documenting their existence, the behaviour of these birds is still somewhat of a mystery. What exactly did these feathered aggressors get up to, and why did they disappear? It’s a story that paleontologists have been painstakingly unearthing for over 100 years. What they’ve learned so far suggests the birds were absolutely dominant as predators, voraciously gobbling up prey across the continent.
The second coming
Sixty million years ago the continents had largely assumed the geographic position they occupy now, though what we now know as Central America had not yet been created. South America was an island, and while saber-toothed cats and wolves took over the job of top predators elsewhere, most mammals in South America were happy herbivores. This buffet of lumbering vegetarians provided the fresh flesh that terror birds feasted on.
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