Confuciusornis bird

[Clodis Hunt <chunt@inf.net> (by way of Jeff Poling <jpoling@infinet.com>)]

Hello,

I seen your home page and think it has a lot of good information.  I would
like for you to link 
to my home page, and return, I will link to yours. This newspaper artical
below will give you a  
better insight as to the relationship with Archaeopteryx and the so called
link to dinosaurs and 
our modern day birds.    

                                Scientists detect bird who ruled
                                       prehistoric roost

                                     Confuciusornis sanctus

 The recent discovery of this ancient bird now called Confuciusornis sanctus
found in a north 
China farm field puts a lid on the trash for the scientist who, with
Elementary understandings 
has tried to lead us to believe that such a beast as the Dinosaurs and the
modern day birds are 
decedents of such a beast, as the Dinosaurs.

                                           Clodis Hunt


                        The Kansas City Star, Thursday, October 19, 1995 


    A University of Kansas scientist and three colleagues have identified
the worlds oldest 
beaked bird, whose fossilized remains were found in a north China field.
Dubbed "Confuciusornis 
sanctus," or the holy Confucius bird, it lived some 140 million years ago
during the Jurassic 
Period, according to their findings published today in the British science
journal Nature.

"The history of bird evolution is being rewritten right now in China," KU
scientist Larry Dean 
Martin said Wednesday. It's going to change the whole shooting match."

For years, those who study dinosaurs have feuded with scientists such as
Martin, who study birds. 
The issue: Are modern birds descendants of dinosaurs? The dinosaur group
believes they are; 
Martin and others believe they're two different creatures.

"Score one for us," Said Martin, who fielded phone calls Wednesday from the
New York Times, Time,
international science journals and other reporters.

Finding the Confuciusornis--smaller than a crow, but more bird like with its
beak and feathers 
adds credibility to the bird scientists' side of the debate, he said.

"The evidence for birds being dinosaurs has become less and less clear. In
my opinion, the coffin 
on that case is nailed now, and hermetically sealed."

The debate had focused largely on the archaeopteryx, The oldest known bird,
discovered in 
Germany. It was a beakless bruiser with sharp, alligatorlike teeth.

Until now, archaeopteryx was thought to be the only bird to exist in the
Jurassic Period, which 
was about 140 million to 195 million years ago. It is slightly older than
the Confucius bird, 
Martin said.

The discovery establishes that birds were around before the dinosaurs from
which Martin's 
opponents contend birds descended. "One's parents should be older than their
descendants," Martin 
noted.

The discovery also adds credence to the theory that birds were divided into
two distinct groups 
during the age of dinosaurs. One group lived on land in trees. The other
lived at water's edge.

The first group, which was more dominant and included Confuciusornis and
archaeopteryx, became 
extinct. From the latter group came modern birds. Last spring, a Chinese
farmer in Liaoning, 
northeast of Beijing, discovered the Confucius bird fossil. A few weeks
later, Chinese 
pa;eontologist Hou Lianhai and Zhou Zhonghe, now a graduate student at KU,
were in the area doing 
research when they were given the fossils.

In October, the Chinese scientists visted Martin in Lawrence, which led to
the description of the 
bird and the journal article. The fourth author is Allen Feduccia, a biology
professor at the 
University of North Carolina , Chapel Hill.

For Martin, 52, this is his most stimulating discovery in 30 years of
science. "This is the most 
exciting thing I've ever been close to," he added.

KU is one of the world's centers for study of prehistoric birds, and
Martin's work may not be 
over.

During one interview, a western Kansas man called to tell Martin he found
some fossils, In that 
area of Kansas, the Niobrara chalk is known to have remains of the second
type of birds, the ones 
that lived near water.

"If I could find a bird there as old as the archaeopteryx, that would be a
big one," Martin said.
                                                                            
          

Congradulations to the staff and associates of KU for their work in proving
there are no links
                              from the Dinosaurs to our modern day birds.

                                           Clodis Hunt