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Note: Resource references sometimes change rapidly. You may have to search the index at the reference site.


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2001 

April 25, 2001  American Museum of Natural History, New York, New York,  United States China On Display at AMNH beginning  April 25, 2001. End date not known. Probably no sooner than May 25, 2001. Nature Magazine Paper by Ji Qiang, Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences and Mark Norell, Chairman of the Division of Paleontology at the AMNH Page 12 Resources High Resolulution Photos These are LARGE photo images and take several minutes to load. 1 - Top Left 2 - Top Right 3 - Bottom Left 4 - Bottom Right

Did those feathers tickle or what? First complete specimen of feather-covered dinosaur that couldn't fly  unveiled at American Museum of Natural History in New York City.   Page 1 2 Resources FINDING THE DINOSAURS Peasant farmers in China don't make much money. Because they can't get a job at the local MacDonald's in the evening, they look for other ways to get a little cash. A great way to do that is to sneak into the Yixian Formation in their spare time to find fossils. "The layers of volcanic and sedimentary rock called the Yixian Formation in China's Liaoning Province have an amazing number of fossil fish, birds, insects, reptiles, shrimp, flowers, mammals and (oh yeah) dinosaurs dating back to the late Jurassic and early Cretaceous times -- between 145 and 120 million years ago." says a press release from the AMNH. (We here at D.I.G. like these press releases 'cause they cut down out research time! Awesome.)  There were many lakes and volcanoes. When the volcanoes erupted, they filled the lake bottoms with a very fine dust or silt. If primitive animals died and sank to the bottom of a lake, they were immediately covered with the silt. Since there is little oxygen in the cold, volcanic silt, the animals did not decay very much if at all. These Chinese dinosaur fossils have incredible detail including preserved fish scales and feathers.     A waterfilled pit that may contain more fossils. Since most of these poor farmers don't sit about and watch television in the evening, they spend their time rummaging around looking for fossils. This is a good thing and a bad thing. The good part is that the farmers discover some amazing fossils. The bad part is that they are not trained properly to document the find and to remove the fossils from the rocks without damaging them. Examining slabs hoping to find more fossils.  Notice that the sneakers are not Nikes or any other trendy brand.   Basically it is a game of luck. There are thousands and thousands of slabs of rock laying around. The amateur fossil hunters either pick them up or pull them out of the side of a cliff and crack them open hoping to find a fossil. One day they really lucked out! A farmer found a fossil foot in a small slab of rock. The farmers removed the rest of the slab in pieces. Each piece is marked with a red crayon so that they can re-assemble them later. Paleontologists have tried to get the farmers to tell them where the fossil is so it can be removed properly, but they have not had much luck. The farmers are very secret about their finds so that they can be the only ones who get the money for them. An amazing thing happened, however. When the pieces of slab were cracked open, they split perfectly down the middle! Part of the fossil is on each side of the opened slab, showing remarkable details. Notice the red mark on the rock. This is a guideline for the Chinese farmers to help them put the pieces of the rock back together in the proper order. Paleontologists know that this defaces the fossil and interferes with study. This is a detail of the arm from the right hand slab. Paleontologists are now offering extra bounty money to fossil hunters who let the scientists remove the speciments from the rock themselves. Only time will tell if this method helps out. DINOBIRDS AND DUCKS Some of our sharpeyed readers have noticed that this dinosaur does not look exactly like a duck. In fact, it is probably not even in the same family as ducks in the modern cladistic sense. Nonetheless, we think that there is a resemblance and present these pictures as proof. Here is a side by side comparison.   Daffy Duck as he appeared early in his career circa 1937. This is, in fact, one of the earliest known images of the famous black duck. He may belong to the species Anas rubripes. Notice the down on the top of his head, but the lack of dentures. What appears to be a single nostril is visible about 1/3 of the way back on the bill. This may be because this is a profile. If the drawing of the other side of the head was available, a nostril might have been there as well. This drawing is sometimes attributed to Bob Clampett, an early avian reconstructor and dinosaur aficionado.  The duck-resembling "dino-bird" as drawn by Mick Ellison of the AMNH. Apparent characteristics are teeth, "down" on the top of the head, and the mouth extending back well past the eyes toward a skinny throat. The teeth have little sharp points unlike the late Daffy teeth which seem to be flat like ungulate teeth. At some point in evolution, Daffy obviously diverged and became vegetarian. No soft tissue survives, so we don't know if the dromeosaurid had a tongue like Daffy's. Daffy Duck as reconstructed in his later career circa 1955. Notice the appearance of teeth (which resemble cow teeth or human molars). There is no apparent nostril opening leading to the interesting evolutionary question of how the animal was able to breath especially considering how much and how rapidly he talks. Lack of nostrils in this later form combined with the derived necessity of taking big, quick breaths through an open mouth, may account for Daffy's "lisp." The careful observer will note the overlap of certain characteristics that lead to the conclusion that there is a relationship between this early dromaeosaur and the later bird families including anatidae. The main difference, we think, is that the newly discovered dinobird was apparently able to keep his mouth shut. This is something that Daffy never was able to manage. We'd be pleased if other readers shared their opinions of this important evolutionary lineage.

RESOURCES AMNH Dinobird Press Release Information - 4/25/2001 AMNH Paleontology Site DinoBird Information - 4/25/2001 Nature Magazine BBC Online Wednesday, 25 April, 2001, 18:52 GMT 19:52 UK           Dinosaur was covered in feathers Luis Rey's painting of Microraptor zhaoianus. (4/27/2001) Todd Marshall's painting of New Feathered Dromaeosauridae (4/27/2001) Ostriches On Line - More about feather boas than you ever wanted to know. You can buy them there, too. The Feather Site - Feathers on dolls. Not as much fun as Ostriches Online. Oh well. Porky's Duck Hunt - Internet Movie Database Whistling Tree Ducks with long, long legs and short short wings from Ornamental Waterfowl Page - pictures of ducks, geese and more! Anatidae Family Timeline. Check out those Eras on the handy D.I.G. Geologic Timeline S.To.P.P. Society to Preserve People. A new D.I.G. feature. Coming soon!

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Entire Contents (c) 2001  Edward Summer, All Rights Reserved
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