**How did a prehistoric bird use its teeth?**

When the first fossil of **__Longipteryx chaoyangensis__** was found in 2020, paleontologists thought its toothed beak suggested it ate fish. Scientists initially compared the ancient bird to the contemporary kingfisher because of its similarly-shaped skull and beak, and diet of small fish, but that resemblance turned out to be a red herring.

[A more recent look](cell.com/current-biology/abstract/S0960-9822(24)01124-2) inside a specimen’s stomach showed the bird — which lived 120 million years ago in — **fed on fruit-like plants**.

The disproportionately large teeth toward the front of the beak of __Longipteryx__ and the thickness of those teeth’s enamel resembles that of a hyper-carnivore, akin to like Allosaurus. Now, scientists suppose that those features weren’t meant for eating, and __Longipteryx__ **was using its head as a weapon, just like modern **** wield their long, narrow beaks as air-born swords to fight off competition for food.**

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