RE: Altitude effects on hummingbird flight?

[evelyn sobielski <koreke77@yahoo.de>]

> The article also (on page 122) notes the discovery
> of
> 30-million-year old hummingbird-like fossils from
> Germany, suggesting that either (a) hummingbirds
> were
> once distributed more widely than the Americas, or
> (b)
> the German fossils represent an extinct group of
> birds
> which evolved convergent flight mechanics to those
> of
> true hummingbirds.

Almost certainly the former (the position of
jungornithids is not 100% certain, but these & hummers
seem to form a monophyletic clade to the exclusion of
other apodiforms). Position of genera Argornis &
Parargornis seems especially noteworthy in that
respect.

Journal of Ornithology: New specimens of the early
Oligocene Old World hummingbird Eurotrochilus
inexpectatus 
DOI: 10.1007/s10336-006-0108-y

"New specimens" because type & description was
published in Science, 2004:
Old World Fossil Record of Modern-Type Hummingbirds
DOI: 10.1126/science.1096856

Regards,

Eike


        

        
                
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