Tiny prehistoric bird wings discovered by Bristol scientist

A fossil expert from the University of Bristol is part of a team that has discovered tiny bird wings encased in amber in Myanmar.

It's thought they come from baby birds that got trapped in the sap of tropical trees a hundred million years ago.

Insects and other creatures have been spotted in the Burmese deposit before but this is the first time whole parts of birds have been found.

The tiny fossil wings measure just two or three centimetres long.

They contain the bones of the wing, three long fingers with sharp claws - clambering about in trees, as well as the feathers, all preserved in exquisite detail.

The anatomy of the hand shows these come from enantiornithine birds, a major group in the Cretaceous, but which died out at the same time as the dinosaurs, 66 million years ago.