Feducciary challenges:Nonsense.

[Luis Rey <luisrey@ndirect.co.uk>]

Ken Kinman wrote:

> "feathers" of this fossil show up as brown stains on the slab, and
> yet the brown stains in this picture are missing from the area contacting
> the femur.  But there are lots of brown stains several inches away from it.

The danger of making assumptions from badly printed pictures in newspapers.
This comment comes from someone that has only seen those pictures. When I saw
the specimen in person, the yellowish-brown stains also fooled me into thinking
that they >only< represented the feathers... but  I was extremely surprised
when I noticed that the fibers went well beyond the stains, something that is
almost impossible to see properly in the photographs.

>
> Are the "feathers" on the femur several inches long with the proximal parts
> not preserved?  It would be highly unusual to say the least.  If so, then
> this "dino-bird" has "leg warmers": long feathers sticking out of its
> thighs.  How an animal can run with long stiff feathers sticking out of its
> thighs is beyond my imagination.

This demonstrates that the person talking has no experience of how 'hair'
impressions fossilize.  Who says the 'leg warmers' were stiff hairs? After
having seen the Messel mammal specimens (which, I suppose, nobody quarrels
about being 'hairy'), the way the dromaeosaur is preserved (and
Sinosauropteryx, and all the others) are perfect examples that match any of the
Messel examples.

> Also note the striations in the matrix
> between the femur and the brown stains.  It appears that these lines are
> present even when the integument/"feather" (brown stains) isn't there.

Precisely. Brown stains are not synonymous with the feathers.. it might have
been misplaced pigment coloration though!

>
> These two facts strongly suggest that at least some of these so-called
> "feathers" are simply preservational and/or preparational artifacts.

Total and absolute nonsense . See the fossil before making assumptions.
Feducciaries are experts in not seeing the evidence before talking.

>
>      Concerning the claim that this fossil is a dromaeosaur, I see no
> evidence of a sickle claw.  If this is the closest "nonavian" relative of
> birds, then it disproves the hypothesis that dromaeosaurs are the sister
> group of birds.

There's a distinctively small 'sickle claw' in an hyperextendable toe. See the
Nature paper photographs.

>
>      Lastly, the claim that dinosaurs needed insulation is simply ludicrous.
>   Even therapsids didn't need insulation in the warm, equable Mesozoic
> climate and there is no evidence that they had fur or Harderian glands.  It
> is only when their descendants (the mammals) became small (~50mm total
> length) and nocturnal that the first evidence of fur appeared (in the form
> of Harderian glands), in the earliest mammals (Ruben and Jones 2000,
> Selective Factors Associated with the Origin of Fur and Feathers, Amer.
> Zool. vol.40, #4).  A duck-sized, presumably diurnal dinosaur like this one
> would almost certainly not need insulation.

As we all know there are no hairy mammals in equate climates or are they? Lion
manes are just a figment of the imagination of people trying to sabotage the
great Feduccia Science Plan.
Who says that therapsids didn't have hair? There's is evidence of hair in
therapsids (including possible skin evidence of Estemmenosuchus and cynodonts
like Cynognathus). But I'm not going to get into that.


Luis Rey. Distinguished member of the "Feather Mafia".

Visit my website on http://www.ndirect.co.uk/~luisrey