''Pasquiaornis'' is a prehistoric

flightless bird Flightless birds are birds that through evolution lost the ability to fly. There are over 60 extant species, including the well known ratites (ostriches, emu, cassowaries, rheas, and kiwi) and penguins. The smallest flightless bird is the In ...

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

from the

Late Cretaceous The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous Period is divided in the geologic time scale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous Series. The Cretaceous is named after ''creta'', the ...

. It lived during the late

Cenomanian The Cenomanian is, in the ICS' geological timescale, the oldest or earliest age of the Late Cretaceous Epoch or the lowest stage of the Upper Cretaceous Series. An age is a unit of geochronology; it is a unit of time; the stage is a unit in the s ...

, between 95 and 93 million years ago in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

.Tokaryk, Cumbaa and Storer, 1997. Early Late Cretaceous birds from Saskatchewan, Canada: the oldest diverse avifauna known from North America. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 17(1), 172-176. Two

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

have been described, ''P. hardiei'' and ''P. tankei''. The genus ''Pasquiaornis'' was a member of the

Hesperornithes Hesperornithes is an extinct and highly specialized group of aquatic avialans closely related to the ancestors of modern birds. They inhabited both marine and freshwater habitats in the Northern Hemisphere, and include genera such as '' Hesperorn ...

, flightless toothed seabirds of the

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 145 to 66 million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era, as well as the longest. At around 79 million years, it is the longest geological period of th ...

. Though its relationships to other members of this group are inadequately known, ''Pasquiaornis'' appears to have been one of the more basal lineages. (2004): The Theropod Database
Phylogeny of taxa
. Retrieved 2013-MAR-02.

References

Bird genera Late Cretaceous birds of North America Hesperornitheans Extinct flightless birds {{paleo-bird-stub