Re: new

["Jaime A. Headden" <qilongia@yahoo.com>]

John Hunt (john.bass@ntlworld.com) wrote:

<I did realise the microraptor fossils were dead, fossils normally are. I
did not realise the preservation was not as good as the other Chinese
dino-bird specimens.  I also did not appreciate the tiny size of
Microraptor, so I guess it could have died in the "dead ant" position and
the legs were subsequently squashed down.>

  Actually, most of the Lower Cretaceous Liaoning/Liaoxi/Nei Mongol
fossils are preserved much as in the microraptor specimens, in that bone
is crushed, diameters distorted, longitudinal and sometimes transverse and
diagonal cracks are present, shapes deformed, and skulls tending to be
"shattered" in nature with some disarticulation (the holotypes of
*Sapeornis* and *Microraptor zhaoianus* are disarticulated, the former
more than the latter). There are very few "complete" skulls, and pelvises
are almost always disarticulated to some degree, limbs broken and
shattered or digits distorted. 

  Most of the time, "vertical" elements are rotated, but many times, this
is not the case. The ilia of the holotype of *Sinornithosaurus millenii*
are variably preserved: on one side, the ilium is viewed ventrally, while
on the other it is viewed medially. In the *M. zhaoianus* CAGS specimens
described by Hwang et al. (2002), the ilia are crushed and distorted side
to side, as noted previouslys, and probably in a toric fashion as the
postacetabular ala is usually wider than the preacetabular ala, and in
these specimens, they are given the same width whereas *Sinornithosaurus*
suggests they were uneven in width, as in birds.

  Cheers,

=====
Jaime A. Headden

  Little steps are often the hardest to take.  We are too used to making leaps 
in the face of adversity, that a simple skip is so hard to do.  We should all 
learn to walk soft, walk small, see the world around us rather than zoom by it.

"Innocent, unbiased observation is a myth." --- P.B. Medawar (1969)


        
                
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