Re: Hesperornis sp. nov.

[Dinogeorge@aol.com]

In a message dated 11/15/02 1:21:33 PM Pacific Standard Time, 
dbensen@bowdoin.edu writes:

<< All the early neorniths _are_ shorebirds, after all (except maybe for that 
parakeet).   >>

This is almost certainly the result of preservational bias. Most Mesozoic 
sedimentary rock was laid down in aquatic deposits. Dry land is ordinarily 
where sediment-bearing water flows away from, not to. We'll probably never 
find fossils of Mesozoic land birds unless they straggled from time to time 
into shoreline areas.