RE: did Jurassic dinosaurs have feathers?

["Thomas R. Holtz, Jr." <tholtz@umd.edu>]

> From: owner-DINOSAUR@usc.edu [mailto:owner-DINOSAUR@usc.edu] 
> On Behalf Of Anthony Docimo
>
>  I was reading a book today that had paintings and drawings 
> of a lot of the presently-known archosaurs (including 
> Shu(u)via, Microraptor, and a pterodactyl whose long incisors 
> and long fingers have some suggesting it was a vampire)...

Ugh.

> ....and while all the "birds" had feathers, in both the 
> Jurassic and Cretaceous  (the book was arranged by era *then* 
> by clade)...the maniraptors and other predatory dinosaurs 
> only were illustrated with feathers  in the Cretaceous.
>  
>  is there reason to think that Jurassic predatory dinosaurs 
> would/wouldn't be feathered?

Jurassic maniraptorans would have almost certainly have been feathered.
Compsognathids and tyrannosauroids would be fuzzy. More basal theropods
(including Allosaurus, Ceratosaurus, etc.) would be scaled.

The reason they weren't in that book: out of date science. Or artistic
cowardice...

Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
Email: tholtz@umd.edu   Phone: 301-405-4084
Office: Centreville 1216                        
Senior Lecturer, Vertebrate Paleontology
Dept. of Geology, University of Maryland
http://www.geol.umd.edu/~tholtz/
Fax: 301-314-9661               

Faculty Director, Earth, Life & Time Program, College Park Scholars
http://www.geol.umd.edu/~jmerck/eltsite/
Fax: 301-405-0796

Mailing Address:        Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
                        Department of Geology
                        Building 237, Room 1117
                        University of Maryland
                        College Park, MD 20742 USA