Re: Why did small dinos become extinct?

[David Marjanovic <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> I have wondered why tehre was not a mass exctinction to go with the really
> hot period at the Paleocene-Eocene boundary.

Probably because most of the world already was a tropical paradise, and 
because most or all that could have died out had already died out 10 Ma 
earlier.

> What went extinct then?

Lots of benthic foraminifera and a few plants, AFAIK.

> Also, were there not fairly good sized carnivorous feathered dinos, aka
> toothed predator birds, running around atleast until then?

Not one of them had teeth (the youngest known bird tooth comes from the 
Maastrichtian of Maastricht in the Netherlands); it appears that, with the 
exception of the phorusrhacids, they weren't predators (at least most of the 
time); and they all continued into later times.