CHINESE BIRDS

[steve.cole@genie.com]

Chinese scientist finds oldest ancestors of birds
 LONDON, Jan 11 (Reuter) - A Chinese scientist said on Thursday he believes
he has discovered the earliest known ancestors of modern birds.
 Lian-hai Hou, writing in the New Scientist magazine, said he had discovered
two fossils in China's Liaoning province. The first, about the size of a
budgerigar, had a highly-developed breastbone, which would have supported strong
flight muscles.
 The other has a short tailbone similar to that of modern birds, which places
the body's centre of gravity over the wings and allows the tail to be used as a
rudder.
 Both fossils are believed to date from the Jurassic period and are only a
little younger than what is thought to be the earliest known bird,
Archaeopteryx.
 But Hou says the newly-discovered fossils would have been much stronger
fliers than Archaeopteryx, which has been labelled by some as not a bird but a
feathered dinosaur.
 Archaeopteryx did not have a well-developed keel bone and could probably
manage only short, clumsy bursts of flight.
 The first of Hou's two fossils had legs that were long below the knee and
short above, suggesting it may have lived and fed on tree trunks like a
woodpecker.
 It may also have had a tail-like rudder, like the second of the two fossils,
but Hou was unable to tell because its tail end was missing.
 The fossils were found in a layer of mudstone with bands of volcanic ash,
sediments excellent for preserving fossils but difficult to date properly.
 However, Hou said radiometric dating suggests they are 142 million years
old, about five million years younger than Archaeopteryx.