A High-Latitude Dromaeosaurid, 'Boreonykus Certekorum', Gen. Et Sp. Nov. (Theropoda) from the Upper Campanian Wapiti Formation, West-Central Alberta

Abstract

Dromaeosaurids were rare components of most Late Cretaceous terrestrial ecosystems and are poorly known from high palaeolatitudes. New dromaeosaurid material, including a frontal and associated postcranial elements, is described from a dense monodominant ceratopsid bonebed on Pipestone Creek, near the city of Grande Prairie (Unit 3, Wapiti Formation, upper Campanian), central-western Alberta, Canada. This stratigraphic interval is significant because it records a period of terrestrial deposition at a time when much of the western interior of Canada and the United States was inundated by the Bearpaw Sea. A phylogenetic analysis recovers 'Boreonykus certekorum', gen. et sp. nov., as a derived eudromaeosaur, possibly within Velociraptorinae. The identification of a new dromaeosaurid from the Wapiti Formation simultaneously helps fill an important gap in the record of late Campanian dromaeosaurids, bolsters support for a partly endemic fauna within the Wapiti Formation, and potentially adds to the North American record of a predominantly Asian Velociraptorinae.