Re: New Protoavis Publication.

["Nicholas J. Pharris" <pharrinj@PLU.edu>]

On Thu, 8 Feb 1996, Adam Yates wrote:

> Yes as you may have guessed from the subject heading, half a decade has 
> rolled around and Sankar Chaterjee has published a bit more on Protoavis. 
> The reprint of the paper "Chatterjee S., 1995, The Triassic bird 
> Protoavis. Archaeopteryx 13, 15-31." was recently sent to our lab. In it 
> are descriptions of the post cranial material, drawings of bones (as 
> reconstructed), 

*as reconstructed*--probably the operative concept here.

> a cladogram and a new skeletal reconstruction. If 
> anything the new drawings look even more birdlike than in his Phil. 
> Trans. paper. Especially the pectoral girdle wich he invests with a 
> very large deeply keeled sternum. The skeletal reconstruction still 
> looks ill-proportioned to me, with a puny little pelvis and femur 
> perched on top of lower leg elements that appear to belong to an animal 
> twice the size. Sankar finds that his Protoavis is embedded within the 
> Ornithothoraces (more derived than Iberomesornis and Sinornis). 

Hmmm...Sounds fishy.

> Apparently his phylogentic analysis is in press, to be published in 
> Palaeontographica.
> 
>  Adam Yates     
> 

The Piltdown Bird strikes again!

Nick Pharris
Pacific Lutheran University
Tacoma, WA 98447
(206)535-8204
PharriNJ@PLU.edu

"If you can't convince them, confuse them." -- Harry S. Truman