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| Sapeornis was a soarer | |
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| Topic Started: Jul 22 2017, 02:19 PM (338 Views) | |
| Carlos | Jul 22 2017, 02:19 PM Post #1 |
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Adveho in me Lucifero
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http://rsif.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/14/132/20170182 Specifically, it is compared to modern screamers. |
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Lemuria: http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/topic/5724950/ Terra Alternativa: http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/forum/460637/ My Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Carliro ![]() | |
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| kusanagi | Jul 22 2017, 03:04 PM Post #2 |
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Adolescent
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Sapeornis is between Achaeopteryx and Confusiusornis both in the past considered non-volant because of the wing feathers being supposedly flimsier than modern birds more than anything. How well does a flier have to fly before it can soar? The answer seems to be not at all seeing that the gliding marsupial Petauroides can soar on thermals. Which is not to say I doubt they flew but I doubt such maniraptors were competent fliers, not till Ornithothoraces or so. |
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| Nembrotha | Jul 31 2017, 06:51 PM Post #3 |
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Adolescent
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The Yixian formation never ceases to amaze us with amazing finds. I think it's amazing how little we actually know about the animals and plants that once inhabited this planet. One can only wonder what's next to be discovered... |
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Journey to the Makrinocene, a world in the twilight hours of the Cenozoic! (Slightly Inactive, will eventually pick up) Come to Terra Fantasia, a bizarre world where nothing is as it seems! (Ongoing) Spoiler: click to toggle
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| kusanagi | Aug 1 2017, 08:12 AM Post #4 |
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Adolescent
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Don't forget Balaur was probably a flghtless bird of this type especially if according to Cau et al's expansion of the Brusatte dataset. For some reason herbivorous theropods acquire wierd feet; Balaur, therizinosaurs, Chilesaurus (if it is a theropod - C. is just wierd). Every time I look at theropod trees I am struck just how poorly supported so many clades are toward the bases; for example just about any troodontid, dromaeosaurid or avialan could jump sides and just about any of the basal tyrannosauoids, might not be. Is Nqwebasaurus really an ornithomimosaur? Factor in megaraptors and even the allosauroid-coelurosaur distinction becomes questionable like GSP has been saying for years. What is an alvarezsaur? Haplocheirus seems to connect them to other coelurosaurs but a radically modified neuroanatomy and forearm skeleton means their degree of birdiness is hard to fathom. Extreme cursoriality and skull kinesis scream out homoplasy whenever they turn out close to ostrich mimics or within avialans; they are convergent upon ornithischians in some ways, but at least they seem like higher theropods. As a clade alvarezsaurs resemble the compsognathids and even the megaraptors in some ways. Confuciusornis intrigues me more than most other early Cretaceous protobirds but Epidexipteryx even moreso; I tend to favor E. as a basal oviraptorosaur. There isn't a lot between the different true maniraptor clades but they are the only dinosaurs definitely possessing pennate feathers, a telencephalon of full bird-like grade although if I remember therizinosaurs come very close and the ornithomimosaurs already have avian-type optic lobes (and supposedly so does the supposed Protoavis material suggesting there is a bird-like coelurosaur in the chimaera), and they inherit with ornithomimosaurs and therizinosaurs the avepectoran coracoid and sternum. By way of contrast even basal coelurosaurs had a primitively unexpanded telencephalon of crocodilian grade suggesting something akin to saltation at proto-bird origins. All maniraptors were capable of flapping flight if only awkwardly and their last common ancestor was the first bird by the standard Archaeopteryx used to be labelled so. Were the "scansoripterygids" an arboreal stem group, or is it an artifact of juvenile animals appearing stemward in a matrix relative to related adult forms? Edited by kusanagi, Aug 1 2017, 08:50 AM.
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7:26 PM Jul 10