Pronunciation: can-AHR-dee-uh
Meaning: Duck
Author/s: Prieto-Márquez et al. (2013)
Synonyms: None known
First Discovery: Toulouse, France
Discovery Chart Position: #849
Canardia garonnensis
(the duck from Haute-Garonne)Etymology
Canardia is derived from "canard" (the French word for "duck") in reference to its "duck bill" (members of Hadrosauridae, the family to which Canardia belongs, are affectionately known as "duck-billed" dinosaurs).
The species epithet (or specific name), garonnensis, is derived from "Haute-Garonne" (the department in southern France where it was discovered) and the Latin "-ensis" (from).
ZooBank registry: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:D42E193F-24A1-4A85-B4AF-811E116572B0.
Discovery
The remains of Canardia were discovered at the Tricouté 3 locality of the Maastrichtian-age Marnes d'Auzas Formation, 65 km southwest of Toulouse, Haute-Garonne Department, southern France. During the Maastrichtian, Haute-Garonne was part of the Ibero-Armorican Island of the European Archipelago, which included much of France and Spain.
The holotype (MDE Ma3-16) is a nearly complete right maxilla (tooth-bearing bone of the upper jaw).
Referred material includes three skull bones (MDE-Ma3–17, MDE-Ma3–18, MDE-Ma3–29), two upper jaw bones (MDE-Ma3–15, MDE-Ma3–30), a partial right upper jaw tooth battery and a tooth crown (MDE-Ma3–26, MDE-Ma3–25), two lower jaw bones (MDE-Ma3–19, MDE- Ma3–28), two partial left shoulder blades (MDE-Ma3–12, MDE-Ma3–21), a left upper arm (MDE-Ma3–20), a partial left breast plate (MDE-Ma3–24), and a partial pelvic bone (MDE-Ma3–23) from Tricouté 3, and a skull bone and partial right upper jaw bone (REP-LCR k6-001, in the private collection of Dominique Téodori) from the nearby Larcan locality in the Marly Limestones of Gensac.
All MDE-Ma3 material was originally described in 2003 by Laurent, who thought it represented a single individual of Pararhabdodon, which was the only lambeosaurine known from the Upper Cretaceous of Europe at the time. However, the presence of two left shoulder blades and the fact that the fossils lack any features in common with the species to which they had been asisigned, put the kibosh on that theory. At least two individuals were present in the quarry, but it's impossible to tell which one owns which bones.
