Re: Screaming dromaeosaur biplane killers of the air

["Mickey Mortimer" <Mickey_Mortimer111@msn.com>]

Just wanted to comment on a couple things....

Jaime Headden wrote, in reference to the lateral flange on manual digit
II-1.....

> This is also absent in many
> other basal birds, such as *Cathayornis*, though the type specimen of
> *Sinornis* has what appears to be a broader first than second phalanx of
> the second digit.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. :-)
Sinornis is the same as Cathayornis yandica (Sereno et al., 2002), and shows
and extensive flange on this phalanx.  There is even a smaller flange on
phalanx II-2.  Refer to figure 8.3 in Sereno et al..

> The earliest true alula known occurs in *Eoalulavis*
> from the LJ Las Hoyas of Spain.

Early Cretaceous (Barremian), not Late Jurassic.  Eoenantiornis is also
Barremian, and preserves an alula.

Mickey Mortimer