Re: New Genus for Archaeopteryx

["David Marjanovic" <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> "Jurapteryx" revisited...

*Jurapteryx* would have been the Eichstätt specimen.

> _Wellnhoferia grandis_ gen. et sp. n.

Wellnhofer deserves that.

> _Wellnhoferia_ differs from _Archaeopteryx_
> in a short tail with the estimated number of 16-17 caudals;

What! This is less than in (embryonic) _chickens_ which have 23 prior to
fusion into synsacrum and pygostyle, IIRC!!!

> a nearly
> symmetric pattern of pedal rays II-IV with metatarsals II and IV of equal
> length and digit IV substantially shorter than in _Archaeopteryx_;

So it is a lot less dromaeosaurlike?

> and the
> number of four (instead of five) phalanges of pedal digit IV, which most
> probably results from a phylogenetic reduction rather than individual
> variation.

<gargl> Unique among Theropoda dead or alive, save for the ostriches and the
ergilornithid cranes (which have/had 0 phalanges there). I hope this is not
a copy of the "break" in its third finger.

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