China's 'Home of Dinosaurs' Unearths Egg Fossils

Heyuan City, in Southern China, is called the “Home of Dinosaurs.”

In fact, the city is listed by Guinness World Records as being the home of the world's largest collection of dinosaur eggs.

Earlier this month, 43 large, fossiled dinosaur eggs were unearthed during road works in Heyuan. Officials said 19 of the eggs found were perfectly in tact. [Source: Globoble]

The largest of the eggs found were about five inches in diameter.

The eggs have been turned over to the Chinese Academy of Sciences to attempt to determine the species of dinosaur that laid the eggs.

According to China’s Institute of Vertebrate, Paleontology and Palaeoanthropology, dinosaur egg fossils unearthed in China account for one third of the total found in the world.

The fossils unearthed in Heyuan all come from the late Cretaceous period, 65 million years ago. Of them, seven are of a member of the oviraptor family named Heyuannia huangi, described by Lu Junchang from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2003 and since appraised as a first class state cultural relic.