Re: Giant birds

["Martin Barnett" <martin.barnett3@virgin.net>]

Me:
> >>I've never heard of this before - they don't look any where near as
birdlike
> as the other taxa you mentioned.  What are his reasons for grouping them
> thus?<<
Dan:
> Therizinosaurs 'unbirdlike'?  Where have you _been_?  Therizinosaurs are
like
> big geese with fingers.
>
Firstly, what happened to those four forward facing toes?  Not even very
theropod-like let alone bird (By bird I mean resembling extant forms).
Secondly am I missing something?  Are we talking about Secondarily
flightless here as the case has been made for Dromaeosaurs and Oviraptors,
or just plain old flightless?  The latter I can understand, but those
Therizinosaur arms seem too specially adapted for a secondarily flightless
scenario.  Do we have a candidate for it's flying relative?

Samuel Barnett