Re: SVP 2004 (Saturday, and the PARTY)

["T. Michael Keesey" <keesey@gmail.com>]

On Tue, 07 Dec 2004 14:32:49 -0800 (PST), Jaime A. Headden
<qilongia@yahoo.com> wrote:
>   Steve Brusatte and Paul Sereno presented (actually, Steve did the
> presenting) on a database system called taxonsearch, which should be
> available early next year at www.taxonsearch.com, along with Paul's own
> www.charactersearch.com, which I commented about before.

Whoops -- they will be .org addresses, not .com.

> Essentially, as
> stated a few years back by Nick Longrich, the arms of mononykes were those
> of moles, adapted for tearing open holes into the earth (the next mononyke
> named should bear an allusion to either Set or aardvarks, it would just
> fit so well),
Great idea. (Although "Orycteropodonykus" may be a bit clumsy....)
> but their position and the neck and legs prevented the
> animal from being a burrower, per se. This is one of the talks I really
> wanted to attend....

I attended, and actually he showed that the forelimbs look nothing
like those of moles. They are, however, *incredibly* like those of
anteaters (especially tamanduas, I think?). The difference is that
moles push soft dirt from in front of them to the sides, while
anteaters rip open hard-packed material