Re: No Cretaceous placental mammals?

[K and T Dykes <ktdykes@arcor.de>]

<<If you'll forgive the Linnaean vernacular, I think that Jeff Hecht meant
to say something along these lines:
"It is curious that extant orders of birds seem to have originated well
before the K/T, in contrast to extant orders of mammals.">>

Unless I've been dating that attractive Miss Informed again, the last I
heard was that the unambiguous Cretaceous fossil record for the 28? (or
something like that) extant feathery fraternal orders, was closely
comparable to the weight of seagull droppings on my car.  As I haven't got a
car, that would be less than one.

Then again, I think the most recent thing I happened to read on such
mammal-birdy matters was Benton MJ (1999), Early origins of modern birds and
mammals, molecules vs. morphology, BioEssays, 21, p.1043-1051.  Perhaps
details of the landscape might've changed over the past eight years, but I'd
be surprised to find an impressive nesting colony of such cases has
accumulated.  Still, a bit old or not, the paper's at least easily
accessible on-line.

Benton 1999
http://palaeo.gly.bris.ac.uk/Benton/reprints/1999BioEssays.pdf

PS: It's one of a fairly extensive library of stuff Mike Benton keeps
available.