Julian Hume, one of the study's co-authors.īut as new technology continues to breathe life into once-forgotten findings, perhaps it might be time to rethink the old saying, 'dead as a dodo. More is known about population structure, nesting behaviour, eggs and young of dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals, than that of a bird that disappeared in very recent historical times due to human interference,' said Dr. 'Despite a wealth of scientific and popular documentation, the life history of the dodo continues to elude us. A large percentage of today's research efforts are dedicated to separating fact from fiction. Modern scientists studying the long-gone bird have had little reliable material to work with, save for a few ships' ledgers, several skeletons, and some dessicated body parts. Scientists say they have discovered part of the skeleton of a dodo, the large, flightless bird which became extinct more than 300 years ago.

Less than a century after humans first started scientifically documenting it, it had gone extinct. Leon Claessens.Įver since its discovery by Dutch sailors in 1598 on the then-uninhabited island of Mauritius, the dodo, with its seemingly uncategorizable appearance and peculiar attributes, has stumped everyone who has laid eyes on it. All real Dodo skeletons in museums and private collections today are composites made up from bones that belonged to several individual animals. 'There are so many outstanding questions about the dodo that we were not able to tackle before,' said co-author Dr. The team hopes the 3D model will enable and inspire other scientists to embark on their own investigations of dodo anatomy, behavior, and ecology. Other findings countered popular theories about why the dodo died off, suggesting that over-hunting by humans was not the sole cause of their extinction, but rather predation by rats and other invasive species introduced by settlers was the main driving force behind their disappearance.

Real dodo bird skeleton