In patch of Utah desert no larger than a living room, scientists working a decade ago discovered a late Triassic treasure trove: 18,000 bones from nine unusual species of reptiles, all victims of a watering hole that dried up some 201 million to 210 million years ago. Now, they’re reporting on the most interesting find to date: the oldest ever pterosaur. The find is especially unusual because ancient flying reptiles of that era were thought to live in coastal areas.

Caelestiventus hanseni , whose genus name is Latin for “heavenly wind,” had a wing span of about 1.5 meters (similar to modern-day ospreys) and a flange of bone suggesting it sported a fleshy wattle under its chin—or possibly a small pouch like today’s pelicans. The discovery—which included bits of the skull, jawbone, and a finger bone from its wing—pushes back the record of desert-dwelling pterosaurs a whopping 65 million years , the researchers report online today in Nature Ecology & Evolution .

Despite the special bone flange under its jaw (seen in the reconstructed skull, above), Caelestiventus probably didn’t eat fish, as pelicans do; the desert oasis where it died apparently hosted only reptiles.