RE: on Gastornis

[Jason Brougham <jaseb@amnh.org>]

You're right Ian, that's a pretty casual mess up after doing so much good 
science.

Dr Tütken et al. did calcium / oxygen isotope ratio work on Gastornis bone to 
demonstrate that it had an herbivorous diet:

http://goldschmidt.info/2013/abstracts/finalPDFs/2368.pdf

But in the last sentence they seem to have taken Gastornis for a member of the 
Phorusrhacidae ("terror birds"), which were not related. Gastornis is 
putatively assigned to the Anseriformes, not the Cariamae at all.

Good work spotting that.

-Jason Brougham
AMNH
________________________________________
From: owner-DINOSAUR@usc.edu [owner-DINOSAUR@usc.edu] on behalf of Ian Paulsen 
[birdbooker@zipcon.net]
Sent: Friday, August 30, 2013 6:20 PM
To: dinosaur@usc.edu
Cc: vrtpaleo@usc.edu
Subject: on Gastornis

HI ALL:
 I saw this article:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/08/130829214559.htm

and was wondering if Gastornis is really classified as a "terror bird"?


sicnerely
--

Ian Paulsen
Bainbridge Island, WA, USA
Visit my BIRDBOOKER REPORT blog here:
http://birdbookerreport.blogspot.com/