Scientists give formal name to ‘chicken from hell’ dinosaur

A bird-like dinosaur, which has been called the “chicken from hell” and was some 7 feet tall and 500 pounds when it roamed western North America, finally received a scientific name on Wednesday.

The creature was formally introduced to the scientific community as Anzu wyliei. Scientists also published a description and analysis of its anatomy.

The dinosaur’s moniker comes from a mythological feathered demon plus the name of a Carnegie Museum of Natural History trustee's grandson. 

The beast got its “chicken from hell” nickname long ago at the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh, where a replica of its skeleton has been on display for a decade. Three skeletons were found in a sedimentary rock layer known as Hell Creek Formation in three locations in North and South Dakota, which helped inspire the nickname.

It is the largest North American example of a type of bird-like dinosaur well known in Asia. Its extensive remains offer a detailed picture of the North American branch of these dinosaurs that had remained mysterious since their bones were first discovered about a century ago, the scientists said.

Anzu had a toothless beak and a crest on its skull like a rooster's comb, combined with long arms and sharp claws up to about 4 inches long. It apparently also had feathers over much of its body.

The analysis, published in the journal PLoS One, concluded that Anzu belongs to a group of dinosaurs that scientists knew little about because they had recovered only fragmentary remains from its members. 

In contrast, the three specimens of Anzu from North and South Dakota that were included in the analysis collectively supply a nearly complete skeleton, said Matthew Lamanna of the Carnegie museum.

The dinosaur lived some 66 million to 68 million years ago in a hot and humid landscape like the Louisiana bayou, he said. It ate plants and maybe small animals when it wasn't fleeing from a hungry and much bigger Tyrannosaurus Rex, Lamanna added.

While the scientists’ first choice was to give the creature a Latin or Greek name that translates to “chicken from hell,” Lamanna said the phrase wasn’t as catchy in either language.

"All the names we came up with were just ridiculously unpronounceable," he said.

So "I thought that if I couldn't come up with a name that literally meant 'chicken from hell,' I could at least name it 'feathered demon.'"

Wire services