Elongatoolithus yangjiagouensis

† Elongatoolithus yangjiagouensis is an oospecies from the Early Cretaceous Yangjiagou locality of China, making it one of the oldest known elongatoolithid eggs. Its early stratigraphic age provides evidence that oviraptorosaurian reproductive strategies and elongated egg morphology were established by the Early Cretaceous, well before the major radiation of oviraptorids in the Late Cretaceous. Eggshell microstructure shows the diagnostic branching pore canal system of the family Elongatoolithid