Ancient Giraffe Relative Was Evolution’s Headbutting Champion, Perhaps Besting Dinosaurs

Jin Meng had a hunch that the skull was from an ancient animal when he found it in the Junggar Basin. The skull was strong and heavy, with a plate of bone around the animal's forehead. There were a few neck vertebrae that were clearly thickened, suggesting they were built to endure a lot of force. He realized that the new species may have defeated the dinosaurs in headbutting.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences and the American Museum of Natural History in New York City used to refer to their discovery of a strange beast as "gui shu." The beast has an official name. D. xiezhi was an early relative of giraffes and lived approximately 16.9 million years ago. Unlike living giraffes, who have long been thought to have evolved for hunting at the top of trees, D. xiezhi was most likely the result of sex. The researchers theorize that D. xiezhi males butted heads over mates with a force never before seen in the animal kingdom.

People immediately think about the neck when talking about giraffes. This species shows that even animals that are related can evolve in completely different directions.

The desert of northern China was warm, wet and suitable for a variety of species. A number of clues were used to piece together D. xiezhi's story. They analyzed the tooth and skulls they recovered to see their internal structures. The fossils of more than 50 other species were found in the same area, most of which were ungulates. The evidence showed that D. xiezhi was a grazer and shared some of the same characteristics as a modern giraffe.

The species' head and neck were perhaps some of the strongest ever possessed by a mammal, even though it was not that large. The most complicated head- neck joints in mammals have been described by the researchers.

The Pachycephalosaurus was a famous dinosaur for its headbutting, but dinosaur experts consulted with confirmed that.

There are fierce battles among modern male giraffes. Modern giraffes are not descended from the ancient species. The giraffes use their neck in battle. The authors stated in the paper that the evolution of these necks may have been for fighting. They noted that behavior may have had a strong effect on the evolution of giraffoids.

The new fossils show that the giraffe families have high diversity. The different lifestyles of these animals are reflected in the specialized morphologies.

A paleologist at Yale University who was not involved in the research said that the evolutionary drivers of modern giraffes' long neck is far from a settled question because female giraffes also have a long neck. He says it was likely a combination of natural selection and sexual selection that led to the evolution of modern giraffe neck and limbs.

Sex selection and male-male combat are believed to have led to the evolution of D. xiezhi's head gear. The giraffes' deeper time relatives were even weirder.