Segnosaurs ejected from AVES

["Ken Kinman" <kinman@hotmail.com>]

     I thank Jaime for the detailed semilunate information.
     Segnosaurs clearly do NOT have a "true" semilunate, they do not meet 
the apomorphy-based definition, and I hereby remove them from my proposed 
Class AVES sensu lato.  I never thought they were a sister group to 
Caenagnathiformes anyway, and this clinches it for me.  Eggshell data and 
other morphological data will also help to distinguish segnosaurs from Aves.
    Thus Order Caenagnathiformes becomes the basalmost member of my Class 
AVES (which therefore has no new orders in it at all).  I have now only 
transferred families and plesia.  This "true" semilunate is a great 
character, and I will change its definition a bit since those "unfused" 
segnosaurs are out of there now.  They may still be sister group to AVES 
(unless Coelurus is), so "enigmosauria" could still be paraphyletic (but it 
would be a somewhat worthless one and not worth a formal name).
          ----Cheers,
                Ken Kinman


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