Re:Rahonavis....Both!

["Larry Febo" <larryf@capital.net>]

<Date: 26 Feb 1999 09:52:57 -0500
From: "Norton, Patrick" <Patrick.Norton@state.me.us>
To: "dinosaur list (comment line)" <dinosaur@usc.edu>
Subject: RE: Rahonavis....Both!
Message-ID: <"070AF36D6B5493E7*/c=us/admd=
/prmd=Mainegovt/o=msmail/s=Norton/g=Patrick/"@MHS>>

<Actually, if you accept Chatterjee's claims about Protoavis, you'd have
to believe that flying avian forms were around much earlier than
that---since he claims that Protoavis is more a derived "bird" than
Archaeopteryx, even though it's considerably older.  >

Not if Archie is considered as having actually lost some of these advanced
features (ie. acrocoracoid process and large sternum), and is on its way to
becoming secondarily flightless at the stage in which it was found.