Re: Birds? Serious question

[Jeffrey Martz <martz@holly.ColoState.EDU>]

Joshua Dyal wrote...
> There are still some glaring problems with the dinosaur
> bird link as presented, like the timing of Archaeopteryx relative to
> birdlike therapods such as Troodon (just pointing out one obvious
> example).  I would think, if anything, that Lessem made the best point
> when he said that, if nothing else, the Protoavis find points out that
> any scenario is very poorly corroborated by fossil evidence.

     If I remember right, Chatterjee actually suggested that _Protoavis_ 
was the first bird, and that _Archaeopteryx_ was an example of
convergence, not that there was a link between Protoavis, Arcahopteryx,
and birds, with dinosaurs showing traits convergent to all three. 
     Leaving this debate aside, I think that the link between
_Archaeopteryx_ and dinosaurs is extremely solid, and gets more solid all
the time.  New dinosaurs are popping up all the time that have new and 
diffeent bird-like, or more to the point _Archaeopteryx_ like traits,
the funny ischia and pubis of Unenlagia (sp?) being a notable example.
Poor Fedducia has been advocating a non-dinosaurian ancestor for
Archaeopteryx for years, but the best he has ever been able to come up
with is _Megalanacosaurus_, which looks more like a chameleon with a
superficially _Archaeoptewryx_ like head.  

LN Jeff
O-