Terrestrial bird or dinosaur phalanx from the New Zealand Cretaceous

Abstract

A phalanx of Haumurian age (Late Cretaceous, 65–80 m.y. B.P.) found near the Mangahouanga Stream, Hawke's Bay, North Island, New Zealand, probably pertains to either a land bird or a theropod dinosaur. It is significant in that it further demonstrates the existence of an insular terrestrial vertebrate fauna in New Zealand, well after the land mass had become separated from East Gondwanaland.