Re: Neoflightless Theropods and Roadrunners

[MariusRomanus@aol.com]

In a message dated Thu, 15 Aug 2002 10:23:38 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
DinoBoyGraphics writes:

> I doubt that a reversed hallux is as informative about aboreality as many 
> suppose.  A reversed halluz is good for prey manipulation.<

Sure... I can see that..... It would be like one of those 3-clawed hook type 
things. Kinda like using your first 3 fingers and thumb to grab stuff. But, 
that stuff could simply be bark too. I look at all of this as being pretty 
ambiguous. And, sure, as you say later, there are some discrepencies when it 
comes to the feet morphology of early birds in relation to perching... BUT.... 
I wouldn't expect them to be as "advanced" as modern birds when it comes to the 
world of perching... We are talking about basal avians after all... You know... 
Things don't just start out perfect. Oh, and yes... more than likely, placing 
these basal birds in the trees ALL the time is probably one of those huge over 
generalizations in order to simplify things... or something like that. I'm sure 
they were venturing onto the ground for a good deal of time as well.  I'm not 
exactly sure what some heron feet and what not look like, but, when it comes to 
nesting and such, like the group that does it in t!
he!
 Everglades for example, those suckers are up in the trees even though they 
spend the majority of their time on the ground.

>If theropods exapted airfoils used to control jumps towards flight (as someone 
>suggested recently...), they would best be able to present their feet to the 
>prey.<

And this also goes toward what Mr. Paul first elaborated on in PDW... 
Quadropedal langings in trees... Using the feet to grab the branch while the 
arms swung forward to grip as well. I've never bought the idea of jumping 
around on the ground. And when I see these raptorial animals, I don't picture 
them jumping, trying to use their feet to first grab onto a prey animal... at 
least when you are talking about prey that is of equal mass or larger than the 
predator. Getting your foot claws stuck in an animal that gets away from you 
before you can grab it with your hands would be very, very, very bad for you. 
I've always seen those nice, large hands as being the principle grippers, with 
the feet then swinging under the body to either deliver blows like a cat, or to 
jam in the raptorial claw into the flesh as a sort of mountaineer's ax while 
the hands did the butchering... I guess the tactic used would depend on the 
prey size.... But, we'll never know. :-)

Kris