Re: Caudipteryx and "Whulks"

["Grant Harding" <granth@cyberus.ca>]

Jaime A. Headden wrote:
>Grant Harding wrote:
><Jaime A. Headden said that one slight problem
>with the _Caudipteryx_ wading scenario is the
>shortness of the neck, and yet to me the neck of the
>black heron seemed only as long as that of
>_Caudipteryx_.>
>
>  Much longer, in fact; the neck of herons, ibisis,
>and storks are generally carried in a relaxed state by
>folding against the crop and sternum, so that it loops
>downward. The feathers on the neck and breast both
>mesh together to make it look a lot shorter than it
>is, in fact.

Oh, okay.

>Watch footage of one of these herons
>(night, or black, or green) standing in the water of
>the shore or on a branch, and spear, quick as thought,
>a fish. But they do this by spearing with the tips of
>their jaws, something *Caudipteryx* cannot do, by
>favor of it's more ventrally-oriented premax. teeth.

But the teeth do point outwards, don't they?  (I'm basing my interpretation
on a photograph of Brian Cooley's sculpture, so I could very well be wrong.)
Maybe it speared the "fish" with its teeth, not its beak.

>*Caudipteryx* would have to snatch it up in a way more
>reminiscent of birds of prey (strygiforms, cathartid
>ciconiiforms, falconiforms -- or, owls, New and Old
>World vultures, hawks, eagles, kites, etc.).

Which would be how, exactly?  Sorry...

>In fact,
>I dry a closer analogy to secretary birds,
>*Sagittarius serpentarius,* than to herons, and they,
>too, have long legs but not so long necks (at least
>compared to ciconiiforms -- ie, storks and their
>allies, including New World vultures and teratorns).

That's true - very good analogy, in fact, fits almost perfectly.  But
secretary birds don't wade, so maybe _Caudipteryx_ didn't either; perhaps,
like them, it was a land strider.  Is that what you're suggesting?  Either
wading or land striding could explain the shortness of the arms out of
disuse.

><However, the thing that struck me most was the length
>of the arms. They look much longer than
>_Caudipteryx_'s. But if _C._'s arm *feathers* were
>long enough and fanned out the right way, they could
>fulfill the same purpose. Are the feathers like this?>
>
>  No, they are long only on the carpal (primary) set,
>and taper rapidly. Much of the secondaries are not
>preserved, including those attaching to the humerus,
>to my eye. The umbrella-technique of the night heron
>requires a mobility in the shoulder and elbow not
>paralleled by any non-avialan dinosaur, except for
>perhaps *Archaeopteryx*, given flight studies made on
>the latter. Someone would have to perform a joint
>analysis study on *Caudipteryx* (you hear that Norell
>et al!! :) ) to see if it could, in fact, rotate it's
>arms in such a way.

So it probably couldn't do the umbrella thing.  (Could it have used a
different sort of shadow technique?)  But that doesn't discount the
possibility of it being a wader - although the shortness of the neck might.
You yourself, in that post last year, said "But of course the animal could
always plunge forward, knees flexing dramatically in a split-second strike
at some fish. . . .A wader? No doubt."  Maybe I'm misinterpreting what
you're saying in *this* post.

Comments, anyone else?

-Grant


--
Grant Harding
High school student/amateur paleontologist
granth@cyberus.ca
Visit Grant Harding's Dinosaur Destination at
http://www.cyberus.ca/~sharding/grant/
"There's no such thing as a fish!"