Re: ALULAS, BATS, PTEROSAURS

["Tim Williams" <T.Williams@cclru.randwick.unsw.edu.au>]

Ronald I. Orenstein says:
 
> I still hold to the view that the considerably greater diversity seen in
> birds than in bats (or pterosaurs) is primarily (though not entirely) due to
> the fact that birds have decoupled their wing mechanism from the hind limb,
> allowing a far greater range of adaptations for walking, wading, swimming,
> climbing etc.

Not in contradiction to the above statement, but there are those who 
said that pterosaurs did the same.  Some restorations of certain 
pterosaurs show their hindlimbs having no part at all in the wing 
apparatus.

This is way off on a tangent, but there's a book called _After Man_ 
which shows what life may look like millions of years in the 
future.  Among the weird and wonderful hypothetical life forms are a 
group of terrestrial, island-living bats which have lost the power of 
flight, and use their forelimbs for locomotion and their hindlimbs 
for siezing prey.  The illustrations are unreal!!!!

Tim