NEW NEORNITHINE & PTEROSAUR STUFF

[darren.naish@port.ac.uk]

Hope all who attended had fun at SVP. This year was conference-free 
for me, due to reasons discussed below. Anyway, as Ralph would say, 
here are some new refs...

Mayr, G. 2001. New specimens of the Middle Eocene fossil mousebird 
_Selmes absurdipes_ Peters 1999. _Ibis_ 143, 427-434.

What with _Selmes_, _Masillacolius_, _Eocolius_ and (most recently) 
_Oligocolius_, it's looking increasingly likely that coliiforms were 
among the most important small landbirds of the Eocene-Oligocene of 
North America and Europe. The new material described here 
(including a stunning complete skeleton) allows _Selmes_ to be better 
diagnosed, though Mayr remains uncertain as to whether it's a coliid or 
a sandcoleid (as Gareth Dyke showed at SVPCA Edinburgh, and as 
Dyke and Waterhouse hint in the _Eocolius_ paper, the latter group is 
probably a paraphyletic assemblage of basal coliiforms). Mayr makes 
the innovative suggestion that _Palaeospiza_, the fabled 'early oscine' 
of Oligocene N. America, might be a coliiform. Needs further study.

Mayr, D. & Daniels, M. 2001. A new short-legged landbird from the 
early Eocene of Wyoming and contemporaneous European sites. _Acta 
Palaeontologica Polonica_ 46, 393-402.

The strange new taxon _Fluvioviridavis platyrhamphus_ ('broad billed 
Green River bird') - previously referred to the ?steatornithid _Prefica_ 
(see comments on identity of this taxon in Cracraft's recent paper on 
southern neornithine origins) and figured in Feduccia (1996) as a 
possible roller-like caprimulgiform - is here described and discussed. 
The type specimen (complete skeleton) is from the Green River Fm, 
but referable material is from Messel and the London Clay. 
_Fluvioviridavis_ lacks derived characters that allow it to be 
convincingly allocated to a neornithine clade. Its short tarsomet and 
expanded proximal humerus suggest comparisons with 
caprimulgiforms but it has an alular claw and cup-like scapular facet 
on the coracoid, indicating that it is basal within the 'higher landbird' 
assemblage. Long wings and tyrannid-like bill suggest an aerial, 
insectivorous mode of life. 

Sayao, J. M. & Kellner, A. W. A. 2000. Description of a pterosaur 
rostrum from the Crato Member, Santana Formation (Aptian-Albian) 
northeastern, Brazil [sic]. _Boletim do Museu Nacional_ 54, 1-8.

As a Martill student, I have to regard the Crato as a formation, not as a 
member of the Santana Fm. Anyway, this is a description of the partial 
rostrum previously figured in Frey and Martill's _Arthurdactylus_ 
paper. The similar tooth spacing and presence of a medial groove on 
the dorsal surface of the conjoined lower jaw tips indicates that the 
specimen is referable to _Brasileodactylus_ and Sayao and Kellner 
regard it as _B. cf. araripensis_. Of course, if _Arthurdactylus_ is an 
ornithocheroid (and not a tapejarid), this specimen might be referable 
to that genus. I think I recall Dave Unwin saying that 
_Brasileodactylus_ is a probable synonym of _Anhanguera_.

Finally, the September 2001 Toulouse meeting 'Two Hundred Years 
of Pterosaurs' (another conference I declined to attend) has produced 
an abstract volume - vol. 11 of the journal _Strata_. Includes many 
abstracts, some of them a few pages long, which I cannot list here. 
Highlights include Buffetaut et al on the Transylvanian giant, Cloward 
and Carpenter on a new large Morrison scaphognathine (maybe the 
new taxon _Harpactognathus_, though not named in the abstract), 
Mazin et al on possible rhamphorhynchoid tracks from Crayssac 
(update to their previous report), Dave Peters on sexual selection as a 
mechanism for wing evolution and Silvio Renesto on interpretation (or 
misinterpretation?) of megalancosaurs as gliders - seems to take a 
slightly different stance on this issue than in Silvio's 2000 paper on 
_Megalancosaurus_. Also loads of stuff on pterosaur tracks, soft 
tissues, histology, limb mechanics and distribution. 

These abstracts stem from presentations given at the conference, many 
of which were previously reported here by Silvio and Fabio Dalla 
Vecchia.

Right, that's it for now. One of the reasons for my absence over the last 
few months has been the arrival of baby Will Darren Naish, born at 00-
10 on Thursday 20th September (10 mins into his official due date - 
unlike his mother he is punctual). Will and Toni (his mum) are both 
happy and healthy and care of neonatal hominids is already turning into 
quite an adventure. Oh yeah, please go and buy the new Dorling 
Kindersley book (_Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs & Prehistoric Life_) I 
wrote with David Lambert - I need the money:)

DARREN NAISH 
PALAEOBIOLOGY RESEARCH GROUP
School of Earth & Environmental Sciences
UNIVERSITY OF PORTSMOUTH
Burnaby Building
Burnaby Road                           email: darren.naish@port.ac.uk
Portsmouth UK                          tel (mobile): 0776 1372651     
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                                       www.palaeobiology.co.uk