ORNITHODESMUS again

[darren.naish@port.ac.uk]

The following just arrived...

Carpenter, K., DiCroce, T., Gilpin, D., Kinneer, B., Sanders, 
F., Tidwell, V. & Shaw, A. 2002. Origins of the Early and 
"Middle" Cretaceous dinosaurs of North America: 
implications for plate tectonics. In _Proceedings of the 
International Symposium on new Concepts in Global 
Tectonics, May 2002, Otero Junior College, La Junta, CO_, 
pp. 289-308.

Excellent review discusses similarities between Yellow Cat 
Fauna and European ones while pointing out that some 
elements of this fauna seem to be relicts from the Morrison. 
Obviously the Mussentuchit Fauna (which may include a 
therizinosaur - p. 294) shows an Asian influence. There are 
life restorations here of _Cedarosaurus_ and _Planicoxa_, 
the first I've seen. 

However, one comment in particular has caught my 
attention: when talking about small theropods Carpenter et 
al. (2002) say that 'A sacrum most certainly troodontid, 
called _Ornithodesmus cluniculus_ (Howse and Milner 
1993, contrary to Naish et al., 2001), is known from the 
Valanginian of the Wessex Formation'. 

'Most certainly troodontid'? It is possible that new 
(unpublished) troodontid material does demonstrate 
troodontid affinities for this taxon but otherwise was argued 
by Makovicky (1995), Norell and Makovicky (1997) and 
Barsbold and Osmolska (1999), and not just by Naish et al. 
(2001). Norell and Makovicky have shown that the 
specimen exhibits features not seen in troodontids, so I'm 
not sure why Carpenter et al. state what they do. 

-- 
Darren Naish
School of Earth & Environmental Sciences
University of Portsmouth UK, PO1 3QL

email: darren.naish@port.ac.uk
tel: 023 92846045