Catenoleimus is a prehistoric bird

Bird

Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...

 genus

Genus

In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...

 from the Late Cretaceous

Cretaceous

The Cretaceous , derived from the Latin "creta" , usually abbreviated K for its German translation Kreide , is a geologic period and system from circa to million years ago. In the geologic timescale, the Cretaceous follows the Jurassic period and is followed by the Paleogene period of the...

. It lived during the mid-late Turonian

Turonian

The Turonian is, in the ICS' geologic timescale, the second age in the Late Cretaceous epoch, or a stage in the Upper Cretaceous series. It spans the time between 93.5 ± 0.8 Ma and 89.3 ± 1 Ma...

 stage, around 90 million years ago. A single species

Species

In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring. While in many cases this definition is adequate, more precise or differing measures are...

 Catenoleimus anachoretus has been described, and this is only known from one piece of coracoid (specimen PO

Pô

-External links: Burkina Faso Ministry of Culture, Arts and Tourism's web site for this area...

 4606), found in the Bissekty Formation

Bissekty Formation

The Bissekty Formation is situated in the Kyzyl Kum desert of Uzbekistan, and dates from the late Cretaceous Period. Laid down in the early the Turonian to Coniacian stages, it is dated to about 90-85 ma .The Bissekty Formation is characterised by a mix of marine, brackish, freshwater, and...

 of the Kyzyl Kum

Kyzyl Kum

The Kyzyl Kum , also called Qyzylqum, is the 11th largest desert in the world. Its name means Red Sand in Turkic languages. It is located in Central Asia in the doab between the rivers Amu Darya and Syr Darya, and is divided between Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan...

 in present-day Uzbekistan

Uzbekistan

Uzbekistan , officially the Republic of Uzbekistan is a doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of the six independent Turkic states. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south....

.

This bird appears to be a mid-sized enantiornithine, perhaps 20–25 cm long in life. The morphology

Morphology (biology)

In biology, morphology is a branch of bioscience dealing with the study of the form and structure of organisms and their specific structural features....

 of the bone is rather plesiomorphic compared to contemporary Enantiornithes. On the other hand, lineages of quite basal Enantiornithines are known to have flourished even then and presumably occurred in today's Central Asia

Central Asia

Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...

 also.Thus, the phylogenetic placement of this bird requires more study, which may be pointless without more material of this or related species becoming available.