Re: [darren.naish@port.ac.uk: [FOR DML] Columbiforms and parrot origins]

[Phil Bigelow <bigelowp@juno.com>]

I'm surprised that Darren didn't mention the fossil beak from the Lance
Formation that was assigned to a Cretaceous parrot.  Any new news on this
material?

<pb>
--

On Wed, 19 May 2004 12:54:48 +0100 Mike Taylor <mike@indexdata.com>
writes:
> Forwarded on behalf of Darren Naish.  Enjoy.
> 
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> Organization: University of Portsmouth
> To: mike@indexdata.com
> Date: Wed, 19 May 2004 09:27:08 +0100
> Subject: [FOR DML] Columbiforms and parrot origins
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> Hi Mike
> 
> Here's that post again. Let's hope it makes it this time...
> 
> - -------------------------
> Regarding proposals that parrots might be allied to 
> columbiforms, there are a few things that haven't been 
> mentioned. The idea that parrots might be columbiform 
> derivatives was favoured by Mayr & Amadon (1951) and 
> has been popularised by Feduccia; he wrote '. shorebird 
> derivatives include the sandgrouse, doves, and pigeons
> (Columbiformes), and, through the tooth-billed pigeons, the 
> parrots (Psittaciformes)' (Feduccia 1980, p. 98) and later 
> referred in passing (p. 252 of Feduccia 1996) to parrots as 
> 'the columbiforms' presumed close allies'. Though the 
> inference from Feduccia (1980) is that tooth-billed pigeons 
> are ancestral to parrots, the figure caption on p. 99 states 
> 'The tooth-billed pigeons are probably surviving relicts of a 
> group that became specialized after diverging from the main 
> stem of columbiform evolution, and they show many 
> anatomical features that would be found in the ancestral 
> stock of parrots'. This implies convergence between tooth-
> billed pigeons and parrots, not direct affinity. The Tooth-
> billed pigeon is BTW _Didunculus strigirostris_ from 
> Samoa (though known from fossils to have lived on Fiji, 
> and with an unnamed species of the genus known from 
> Tonga).
> 
> While writing these contradictory comments, Feduccia 
> probably had in mind Philip Burton's 1974 paper on parrot 
> and pigeon jaw and tongue morphology. Burton (1974) 
> showed that _Didunculus_ was more like a parrot than was 
> any other kind of bird in many details of cranial 
> musculature. Burton listed five features seen in 
> _Didunculus_ which 'showed some approach to [the 
> condition in] parrots' and was also impressed by features 
> such as the form of the palatines and quadrates, the fused 
> lower jaw (hey, maybe Stidham's jaw is from a didunculine
> pigeon..:)), the long pterygoids, the short, deep upper jaw, 
> and the broad nasal bars (pp. 272-3). In the conclusions of 
> the paper it's therefore no surprise that Burton proposes that 
> _Didunculus_ may exhibit shared derived states with 
> parrots: Burton cites Cracraft (1972) here so is alluding to 
> the idea that these features might be synapomorphies. 
> Rather than proposing that _Didunculus_ might be near the 
> ancestry of parrots however, Burton chickened out and 
> wrote 'More likely _Didunculus_ is a relict survivor of a 
> specialized group of pigeons which became separated early 
> from the main stock of Columbiformes. This may not be the 
> actual group from which parrots evolved, but clearly shows 
> many of the anatomical features which might have been 
> expected in the stock ancestral to parrots.' (p. 274). 
> 
> So while _Didunculus_ was used by Burton as evidence 
> supporting a possible link between pigeons and parrots, the 
> similarities discovered between _Didunculus_ and parrots 
> were regarded by him as convergent, or in other words were 
> >dismissed< as evidence for a close affinity. As it happens, 
> _Didunculus_ is almost certainly nothing to do with the 
> ancestry of parrots, but Burton would have been justified in 
> proposing a possible affinity at the time. So: why propose 
> an affinity of parrots and pigeons when the 'trump card' (= 
> the cranial characters of _Didunculus_) is deemed an 
> example of convergence? Yes, why indeed.
> 
> Recent work on columbiforms supports the view of 
> Goodwin (1967) and others that _Didunculus_ is well 
> nested within pigeons and is not a disparate relict or part of 
> a group well separated from other pigeons. Janoo (1996) 
> wrote that 'despite the morphological skull divergence,
> _Didunculus_ is a typical columbine'; molecular studies 
> show that _Didunculus_ is part of the same columbid clade 
> as _Goura_ (crowned pigeons), _Caloenas_ (Nicobar 
> pigeons) and dodos and solitaires (Shapiro et al. 2002); and 
> morphological work supports similar affinities but finds 
> _Gallicolumba_ to be close to these pigeons too (e.g., 
> Goodwin 1967, Worthy 2001, Mahler et al. 2003). The 
> bottom line is that, while _Didunculus_ is rather like a 
> parrot in aspects of cranial morphology, it represents the 
> extreme among a group of robust-skulled frugivorous 
> pigeons and is nothing to do with parrot ancestry at all, and 
> therefore should not be inferred to be suggestive of a 
> pigeon-parrot link.
> 
> Refs -
> 
> Burton, P. J. K. 1974. Jaw and tongue features in 
> Psittaciformes and other orders with special reference to the 
> anatomy of the Tooth-billed pigeon (_Didunculus 
> strigirostris_). _Journal of Zoology_ 174, 255-276.
> 
> Cracraft, J. 1972. The relationships of the higher taxa of 
> birds: problems in phylogenetic reasoning. _The Condor_ 
> 74, 379-392.
> 
> Goodwin, D. 1967. _Pigeons and Doves of the World_. 
> British Museum (Natural History)
> 
> Feduccia, A. 1980. _The Age of Birds_. Harvard University 
> Press.
> 
> - - . 1996. _The Origin and Evolution of Birds_. Yale 
> University Press.
> 
> Janoo, A. 1996. On a hitherto undescribed dodo cranium, 
> _Raphus cucullatus_ L. (Aves, Columbiformes), with a 
> brief taxonomical overview of this extinct flightless 
> Mascarene Island bird. _Bulletin du Muséum national 
> d'Histoire naturelle, Paris_ 4e série, 18, Section C, no 1, 57-
> 77.
> 
> Mahler, B., Araujo, L. S. & Tubaro, P. L. 2003. Dietary and 
> sexual correlates of carotenoid pigment expression in dove 
> plumage. _The Condor_ 105, 258-267.
> 
> Mayr, E. & Amadon, D. 1951. A classification of recent 
> birds. _American Museum Novitates_ 1360, 1-32.
> 
> Shapiro, B., Sibthorpe, D., Rambaut, A., Austin, J., Wragg, 
> G. M., Bininda-Emonds, O. R. P., Lee, P. L. M. & Cooper, 
> A. 2002. Flight of the dodo. _Science_ 295, 1683.
> 
> Worthy, T. 2001. A giant flightless pigeon gen. et sp. nov. 
> and a new species of _Ducula_ (Aves: Columbidae), from 
> Quaternary deposits in Fiji. _Journal of The Royal Society 
> of New Zealand_ 31, 763-794.
> 
> - -- 
> Darren Naish
> School of Earth & Environmental Sciences
> University of Portsmouth UK, PO1 3QL
> 
> http://web.port.ac.uk/departments/sees/staff/NaishD.htm
> email: darren.naish@port.ac.uk
> tel: 023 92846045
> 
> Darren Naish
> School of Earth & Environmental Sciences
> University of Portsmouth
> Burnaby Building
> Burnaby Road                           email: 
> darren.naish@port.ac.uk
> Portsmouth UK                          tel: 023 92846045             
>       
> PO1 3QL                                www.palaeobiology.co.uk
> ------- End of forwarded message -------
> 
> 



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